By Alana Gordon
Kaiser Health News, in cooperation with NPR
Originally published November 19, 2012
Immediately after the presidential election, and more than a week ahead of the Nov. 16 deadline, Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon, a Democrat, announced he had made up his mind. The state would not be setting up its own health insurance exchange.
Next door in Kansas, Gov. Sam Brownback, a Republican, made a similar announcement. These governors' moves open the door for increased federal involvement in health care in both states.
President Barack Obama's health law has never had any easy time in this part of the country.
"Kansans feel Obamacare is an overreach by Washington and have rejected the state’s participation in this federal program," Brownback said in a statement.
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Some health policy experts find the situation in Missouri ironic. "We have a state that is very much committed to state rights and state control," notes Thomas McAuliffe, with the Missouri Foundation for Health. "Yet we’re willing to just blindly cede all creation and administration of a health exchange or insurance state marketplace to the federal government." The foundation helped fund efforts to plan an exchange.
The entire story is here.
