It’s still a bit early to start counting chickens, but it looks as though the Mississippi Legislature is ready to expand Medicaid.  Bills to expand Medicaid to provide services to adults under age 65 with incomes up to 138% of the federal poverty level were filed in both the House and Senate, but the Senate let its version die in committee and will now take up the House Bill, which passed by a veto-proof 99-20 margin on Feb. 28.

Although Governor Tate Reeves remains steadfastly opposed to expansion and is leaning on senators to reject the plan, support for expansion continues to grow.

Friday, the influential Mississippi Manufacturers Association announced its support of the bill on social media, stating  “Jason White and the House passed Healthy MS Works, expanding healthcare access to 200,000 working Mississippians. MMA supports improved access to quality healthcare, especially in rural areas, and efforts to promote a healthier workforce.”

The MMA joins a list of 36 Mississippi organizations that have stated their support for Medicaid expansion, a coalition that transcends politics.

All this despite Russ Latino’s manifesto, a missive only slightly shorter than the Unabombers’, opposing Medicaid expansion by applying the same logic used by a man who refuses to take aspirins because they don’t cure cancer.

Latino’s manifesto, which The Dispatch republished in the Feb. 27 edition without even being threatened by a mail bomb, gave a detailed account of Latino’s personal Horatio Alger story as a means of refuting the claim that he hated poor people. If you say so, I guess.

His premise, as best I can understand it, is that Medicaid expansion won’t improve the health of people who don’t currently have health insurance, that it will only serve to make them lazier than they already are. Latino said expansion is unnecessary because most people who would qualify for Medicaid expansion could get fully-subsidized private healthcare available through the Affordable Care Act’s marketplace. Yet the cheapest marketplace plans have deductibles that the working poor simply won’t be able to cover. A few thousand dollars may not mean much to Latino, who seems to have forgotten what it’s like to be poor.

Finally, Latino says that providing health insurance to an estimated 200,000 people under expansion is likely to make future generations paupers because of the national debt.

It is true that Mississippi stands to gain $1 billion in federal dollars through Medicaid expansion. What is also true is that $1 billion represents an increase of federal spending by roughly two-hundredths of a percent. 

So who are you gonna believe? The 40 states that have expanded Medicaid since 2010? The dozens of organizations that have announced their support of expansion?  The 55% of Republicans who favor expansion? The 73% of all Mississippians who support expansion?

Or Russ Latino?

Expanding Medicaid would significantly reduce the $600 million in uncompensated care our state’s hospitals incur every year. That’s an indisputable fact. Those recovered dollars could allow hospitals to provide much-needed pay raises to nurses and other workers, make new hires to alleviate staffing shortages, make capital improvements that help all patients and expand services.

For rural hospitals, it’s a lifeline.

Finally, it appears the Mississippi legislature has reached the same conclusion.

Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].

Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].