Beshear Still Dithering on World's Easiest Decision

Let's see: saying yes gets health care for 400,000 poor and sick Kentuckians at zero cost to the state for a decade, and minimal cost thereafter. What to do, what to do?

Yep, Governor Cowardly Waste of Oxygen is back.

Beth Musgrave at the Herald:

Gov. Steve Beshear said Monday that he will decide by July 1 whether to expand Medicaid, the federal-state health care program for the poor, elderly and disabled.

During a Capitol news conference Monday on an unrelated topic, Beshear said his administration is looking at several factors, including cost, before deciding whether to expand the program that serves about 830,000 people in Kentucky.

It is estimated that more than 400,000 people in Kentucky could be eligible for the program if it expands to include people at 133 percent of the poverty level. For a single person, 133 percent of the poverty level is $15,000.

Beshear said he is getting a lot of pressure from the medical field — particularly hospitals — to approve the expansion. Many Republicans have opposed expansion, saying the state can't afford it.

The Republican-led state Senate passed a bill during this year's legislative session that would have required the two-term Democratic governor to get legislative approval before expanding Medicaid, but the measure died in the Democratic-led House.

"We have a very large uninsured population and we have a very unhealthy population," Beshear said. "Anything that we can do — that we can afford — to make our population more healthy, I'm certainly in favor of doing."