Billions in Rural Health Care Funding Hinge on States Passing Trump-Backed Policies
“The Trump administration offered states a deal: pledge to enact White House-favored policies for a chance to win a bigger share of the $50 billion aimed at transforming the nation’s struggling rural health care systems.
The battle for those funds is now underway.
In pitches submitted in November to the Rural Health Transformation Program that Congress and President Donald Trump created in July, state officials described a crisis in rural America — an explosion of chronic illness, hours-long drives for basic services, a scourge of addiction — and laid out their plans for turning things around.
Democrats and health advocates described the Trump administration’s criteria for doling out the money as highly unusual, and some fear it could be wielded to favor political allies.
“I’ve been working in government and health policy for 20-plus years, and I can’t recall another scenario where it was quite this direct in terms of, ‘If you work on these policy changes at the state level, we will give you funding,’” said Carrie Cochran-McClain, the chief policy officer for the National Rural Health Association, which represents state and local officials who work on rural health.”
Read more at Politico.