The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which passed Congress July 3, is a disaster for Washington State’s hospitals and the patients we serve. There is no way we can absorb this level of cuts in the Medicaid program without massive impacts to all Washingtonians’ access to care.
The biggest risks: Hundreds of thousands of people will lose health insurance, and payments to hospitals for providing services to Medicaid enrollees will be slashed. These provisions jeopardize the health care system for everyone. Important hospital services will disappear, nurses and doctors will be laid off, and several Washington State hospitals are at risk of full closure.
Impacts will be severe for both rural and urban hospitals. To address concerns about rural hospital impacts, the Senate added a “rural health transformation fund” and claims this will protect rural hospitals from the cuts in the bill. The rural fund is wholly inadequate: It adds bureaucracy and administrative hurdles to accessing funds and does not even come close to making up for payment cuts. Offering this as a solution is like punching someone in the face and then offering them a Band Aid.
We applaud the members of our delegation who opposed this bill.
Sincerely,
Cassie Sauer
WSHA President & CEO
cassies@wsha.org