Source:WECT
After being held up for months by state Republican lawmakers’ protracted dispute over the state budget, The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services has gotten the final federal approval to launch Medicaid Expansion.
On December 1, 2023, the state will officially expand Medicaid, providing health insurance to more than 600,000 low-income North Carolinians in the coming months.
“Expanding Medicaid is a monumental achievement that will improve the health and lives of hundreds of thousands of people while helping our health care providers and economy,” Governor Roy Cooper stated in a DHHS press release.
For years, Gov. Cooper and state Democrats have pushed for Medicaid expansion despite Republican’s opposition. After more than a decade of Democrats advocating for the protections of uninsured North Carolinians, state Republicans backed the crucial health care coverage.
According to the press release, DHHS anticipates over 300,000 eligible North Carolinians will automatically be enrolled in full health care coverage.
“For the remainder of those that are eligible, our county partners had been hard at work to ready their systems and their staff and their processes to enroll members as they come forward,” Kody H. Kinsley, NCDHHS Secretary, told The News & Observer.
“We have 1.2 million people in North Carolina without health insurance. Medicaid expansion is going to do a major effort in getting that gap closed.”
For more information about the expanded eligibility for NC Medicaid, NCDHHS launched a new website.
To receive updates, resources, and an alert when the NC Medicaid application process goes live, complete the NC Medicaid sign-up form online.
