Florida lawmakers met this past weekend to begin ironing out the differences between the House and Senate budgets. Senate Healthcare Appropriations Chair Aaron Bean says as of Saturday evening, the two chambers still stood apart on a number of healthcare budget issues. “Nursing homes, there’s major reductions in nursing homes that we don’t take, they do. There’s major reductions in hospitals. We only cut them a little bit they have major and then the postpartum, where they have coverage for 12 months after they have their baby. We made an offer to get to six months." A plan to increase Medicaid coverage for low income mothers of newborns from the current two months after birth to a full year is a priority of House Speaker Chris Sprowls. His chamber included that in the House spending plan. It was not part of the initial Senate budget proposal. But Bean says his chamber has offered to meet the House in the middle, by extending coverage to six months of care.
Healthcare Budget Talks Include Move To Compromise On More Care For New Mothers
