The Washington Post (5/27, MacGillis) reports, "The federal government will bear virtually the entire cost of expanding Medicaid under the new health-care law, according to a comprehensive new study by the Kaiser Family Foundation that directly rebuts the loud protests of governors warning about its impact on their strapped state budgets." Notably, "a disproportionate share of the 16 million people expected to enroll in the expanded Medicaid live in states in the South and West that until now have had very stringent eligibility rules for low-income adults. Governors of many of those states have predicted fiscal calamity for their budgets, and some have cited the Medicaid expansion in the suits they have filed against the new law, saying it violates their states' rights."
        Modern Healthcare (5/27, Evans, subscription required) reports that "the largest gains in coverage and federal spending" will occur "in states with low coverage levels and higher numbers of uninsured, the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured said in newly released state-by-state estimates." The study also indicated that "Medicaid enrollment would increase by 22.8 million and the number of uninsured would drop by 17.5 million."
        Reuters (5/27, Lambert) explains that, according to the study, the federal government will spend an additional $443.5 billion on Medicaid through 2019. In contrast, the states' spending on Medicaid will increase by $21.1 billion, and other types of federal funding will reduce this amount even further. Thus, states such as Maine, Colorado, Massachusetts, and Vermont will reduce Medicaid spending by between 0.5 to 2.1 percent.
        NPR (5/27, Rovner) also points out in its Shots blog, "When 20 states filed suit over the new health law just after President Obama signed it in March, the expansion of Medicaid was a major part of their beef." Yet, "a new study suggests that the Medicaid expansion might cost states less than they think, and some states might actually make money on the deal." In fact, "on average, the federal government will pick up 95.4 percent of each state's expanded costs over that period."
        The San Jose Mercury News (5/27, Zapler) reports, "During the health care debate, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger estimated the new law would impose additional costs of $2 billion to $3 billion annually on California once it is fully implemented late this decade." This study estimates, however, "that from 2014 to 2019, as the reform law is ramping up, California could bear additional costs from $3 billion to $6.5 billion over that six-year period." CQ HealthBeat (5/27, subscription required), the Tennessean (5/27, Theobald), the Lafayette (IN) Journal and Courier (5/27, Groppe), Lexington Herald-Leader (5/27, Trumn), and the Mobile Press-Register (5/26, Reilly) also covered the story.