We have more news from the "if you like your plan, you can keep it" reality check department. And this time, it's about how ObamaCare will savage one of the Left's more beloved programs: the state Children's Health Insurance Program, or CHIP.
As American Enterprise Institute scholar Dr. Scott Gottlieb points out in the New York Post, "CHIP provides health coverage to nearly 8 million children of families with incomes too high to qualify for Medicaid."
While it should go without saying — though Gottlieb says it point blank in the Postarticle — that in being a government-run program, CHIP isn't without its flaws. But, the plans offered to CHIP are often superior to the care they would otherwise get through Medicaid.
It’s now clear that ObamaCare will force tens of millions of Americans to accept inferior health coverage to what they have now. … At risk are CHIPS kids whose parents earn between 100 percent and 133 percent of the Federal Poverty Level — which comes out to $23,000 to $31,000 a year for a family of four.
Here’s how it works: An obscure provision buried the ObamaCare law’s Section 2001(a)(5)(B) automatically enrolls in Medicaid any child whose parents earn between 100 percent and 133 percent of the Federal Poverty Line — even if the kids are now getting better coverage from CHIP.
That means that these kids and their families will join "people who now get their policies from a job at a small business, those who buy individual coverage direct from an insurer, seniors who qualify for Medicaid as well as Medicare" among many others in the ranks of those who, no matter how much they love their present heath coverage, can't keep it.
Who will be next? Stay tuned for more as the reality of ObamaCare begins to set in.