A Georgetown University Health Policy Institute brief examines the impact of the ARRA Medicaid Federal Medical Assistance Percentage (FMAP) increases on children and families.  The brief notes that Medicaid enrollment has increased 3.3 million in the past year, with children accounting for 60 percent of that increase.  The brief also argues that Congress should extend the ARRA FMAP increase to avoid reversing recent coverage expansions

From the report:

Providing services to struggling families has been a challenge for states facing their own loss of tax revenue, and as a result, the vast majority of states have made harmful program cuts.3 Health coverage for children, however, has generally held steady, primarily due to strong public support for children’s coverage4 and help from the federal government.  This has included new funding opportunities created by the renewal of CHIP5 in February of 2009, and most notably, the inclusion in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of extra federal assistance for states’ Medicaid programs.  In exchange for providing some $87 billion in new federal Medicaid dollars, ARRA required states to maintain their eligibility rules for Medicaid, which helped to stave off even deeper cuts in the program.

Full report:  Holding Steady: Medicaid Fiscal Relief and its Implications for America’s Children and Families (PDF | 97.38 KB)

Georgetown University Health Policy Institute.  (2010).  Holding steady: Medicaid fiscal relief and its implications for America’s Children and Families.