Idaho expands postpartum Medicaid coverage to a full year under new law
Mar 27, 2024 | 1:09 pm ET
Description
As of 2021, 41% of women across the United States had Medicaid as their insurance coverage at the time they gave birth, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Medicaid is a government health insurance program for people who qualify according to income and certain disabilities. (Getty Images)
Idaho Gov. Brad Little signed House Bill 633 into law on Monday, which will expand postpartum Medicaid coverage from 60 days to a full year.
Idaho bill to expand postpartum Medicaid coverage to a full year advances
Before the bill was signed into law, Idaho was one of two states — Arkansas being the other — that had not already expanded or passed legislation intending to expand postpartum coverage, according to data from the Kaiser Family Foundation, a health care research nonprofit.
The bill represents one of the recommendations put forth by Idaho’s former Maternal Mortality Review Committee that suggested in its final 2021 report that the state expand postpartum coverage to a year. In the committee’s final report, it found that most of the state’s 17 maternal deaths in 2021 took place while an individual was pregnant or within one year of pregnancy.
The bill, sponsored by Rep. Megan Blanksma, R-Hammett, passed the House of Representatives in a 42-26 vote and later passed the Senate in a 24-10 vote.
The law takes effect on July 1.
Boise, ID
