Children’s Health Insurance Policy Case Study Samples

Introduction

One of the biggest problems that the government considers is the still significant number of uninsured adults in the country. It recently passed the Affordable Care Act in order to increase the accessibility and affordability of healthcare and medical services in the country and policy makers believe that it will do just that. However, what the government apparently fails to see based on their actions and response to the concerns of their critics is that adults and elderlies are not the only ones who get sick—children get sick too. If anything, children should receive the same level of insurance coverage that their parents and grandparents are about to be granted via the different available state and federal government ushered healthcare benefits and grants .

How to Solve Current Problems

After years or even decades of ignoring the problem, the government has finally come up with a viable solution to address the growing number of uninsured children in the country. What they came up with is the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP/CHIP). This program is one of the results of the passing of the Social Security Act which was amended in 1997 . According to the website dedicate for those who want to know more about the program, “CHIP provides low-cost health coverage to children in families that earn too much money to qualify for Medicaid; in some states, CHIP covers parents and pregnant women; each state offers CHIP coverage, and works closely with its state Medicaid program” . The program, at least on paper, is good in itself. If the government can fulfill even at least half of their promises to children and their parents, then healthcare-related problems of the not so well-off families would be solved. Unlike other less viable forms of health insurance, individuals who are covered by the program can have insurance-covered routine checkups, doctor visits, immunizations, prescriptions, laboratory and X-ray services, dental care, vision care, emergency services, admission, and inpatient and outpatient medical and health care . This declaration shows promise but if the government, via the accredited hospitals and medical centers would not honor its enforcement, these promises would only be useless.
One distinct characteristic of CHIP is that it is a taxpayer-funded health insurance policy . This means that the funds that the government uses to pay for overall costs of all healthcare and medical services availed of under the program were from a fund designated by the government which is then acquired from taxpayers’ money. However, it appears that one of the reasons why the program fails to honor coverage requests for certain medical and healthcare procedures, and even accept new memberships even for the eligible ones, is the apparent lack of funding. One way to solve this problem is to look for other sources of funding aside from directly getting the funds from taxpayers’ money. The fund managers’ for example, could seek additional financial support from the state or even the federal government or even via philanthropists, foundations, and other non-government entities and organizations.

Conclusions

In summary, the CHIP program that has been developed more than ten years ago is a good program in itself. However, the government should see that all the promises that they put on paper would be fully enforced and honored; and that there is a sufficient flow of financial resources to fuel and back up the program and fulfill the first point that has been raised. Lastly, CHIP is a great program which when continued without these drawbacks, can continue to be of great use to a lot of families.

References

HealthCare.gov. (2015). The Children's Health Insurance Program. https://www.healthcare.gov/medicaid-chip/childrens-health-insurance-program/.
Lave, J. (1998). Impact of a children's health insurance program on newly enrolled children. JAMA.
Pear, R. (1997). Hetch Joints Kennedy to Back a Health Program. The New York Times.
Sasso, A., & Buchmueller, T. (2004). The effect of the state children's health insurance program on health insurance coverage. Journal of Health Economics.
Selden, T., Banthin, J., & Cohen, J. (1999). Waiting in the wings: eligibility and enrollment in the State Children's Health Insurance Program. Health Affairs.
Volden, C. (2006). States as policy laboratories: Emulating success in the children's health insurance program. American Journal of Political Science.