As state officials shift their focus towards loosening social distancing policies and reopening, they must now grapple with balancing both economic and public health concerns while also considering how reopening policies will impact residents in very different ways, possibly mitigating or exacerbating preexisting disparities. This expert perspective provides a survey of actions that state and local governments have taken to intentionally incorporate equity into their recovery and reopening policies.

Updates from the states as of October 2, 2020.

As states seek to address the social determinants of health and advance health equity, they face longstanding and persistent challenges in collecting complete, accurate, and consistent race, ethnicity and language (REL) data. This expert perspective provides an overview of current REL data collection standards; ideas for increasing completeness in data by engaging the enrollee and enrollment assisters, and modifying enrollment and renewal interface; and provides suggestions for how states could leverage alternative sources of data in order to improve REL data completeness.

Updates from the states as of September, 25, 2020.

In light of recent postal delays and housing displacements caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and related economic crisis, and a wave of natural disasters across the country, state Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) agencies face new challenges communicating with their enrollees about their health coverage. Acting now to mitigate these challenges is essential as states are preparing for the end of the public health emergency (PHE) and “catching up” on coverage renewals for a large portion of their enrollees. This expert perspective reviews strategies that state Medicaid and CHIP agencies may consider to help mitigate coverage losses.

Updates from the states as of September 18, 2020

Updates from the states as of September 11, 2020.

On August 28, 2020, the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) approved new essential health benefit (EHB) benchmark plans for Michigan, New Mexico, and Oregon, bringing to five (with Illinois and South Dakota) the number of states that have revised their benchmarks in recent years. Although many stakeholders were concerned that new rules for EHB benchmark selection adopted in the 2019 Notice of Benefit and Payment Parameters (NBPP) would result in less generous benefits, these five states have modestly enhanced their benefit packages to address perceived gaps in coverage. This expert perspective highlights the efforts in these five states and provide an overview of how other states can consider changing their EHB benchmark plans to enhance coverage.

Updates from the states as of September 4, 2020.

Updates from the states as of August 28, 2020.