The Trump Administration Budget Package, called the One Big Beautiful Bill, is advancing in Congress and is currently waiting for a vote in the Senate. The bill includes the greatest clippings of medical funds ever propose in the history of the program, changes that would probably cause more than 10 million Americans to suddenly lose their medical care coverage.
The American Association Hospital estimates that the approval of this legislation would result in a reduction of $ 50.4 billion in the federal expenditure of Medicaid in rural hospitals during the next decade, as well as 1.8 million people in Rural Medicaage.
This scenario is special worrying because rural hospitals are greater experienced financial challenges, AHA said in a report published last week. It is more exensive to deliver medical care in rural areas due to volumes of smaller patients and higher costs to attract personnel.
The report highlighted a statistic that shows that almost half of rural hospitals operated with a financial loss in 2023. He also noted that 92 rural hospitals have been to obtain the shutter in the last 10 years.
Rural suppliers not only have financial difficulties, but are high or thread the income of Medicaid. In rural communities, 18% or adults are covered by Medicaid.
In nine states, more than half of the population of Medicaid lives in rural areas, the AHA report said. These states are Alaska, Kentucky, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, Dakota del Sur, Vermont and Wyoming.
The report also declared that 47% of births in rural communities are covered by Medicaid.
“Medicaid’s cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Ley would devastate rural hospitals throughout the country,” said the CEO of AHA, Rick Pollack, in a statement. “Many rural hospitals would be forced to choose between maintaining services, keeping staff and possibly close their doors. Patients would be forced to travel to obtain basic or emergency care, and zero communities.”
In addition to the AHA, a group of Democratic senators also published an analysis that evaluated the impact of the budget plan on rural medical care. His analysis found that legislation could 338 rural hospitals at risk of closing its doors.
The states with the largest number of hospitals at risk of closing are Kentucky (35), Louisiana (33), California (28) and Oklahoma (21).
The analysis also declared that hospital closures in the rural areas of America would also represent a threat to many local economies, given the rural hospitals of one of the largest employers in their area.