Rhode Island: Biden-Harris Admin Announces Expansion Of Medicaid Postpartum Coverage In RI, Joining 31 Other States & DC!

Via the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services:

CMS marked another important maternal health milestone by approving Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) postpartum coverage expansion in Rhode Island, an opportunity made possible by the American Rescue Plan. With this approval, 32 states and D.C. have extended postpartum Medicaid/CHIP coverage to a full year.

They include links to the approval letters for both Medicaid and CHIP, but the Medicaid one is oddly both extremely brief ("We received your request; it has been approved") and wonky at the same time, while not being in an easy-to-copy text format.

Here's the CHIP letter, however:

Dear Ms. Sousa:

Your title XXI Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) State Plan Amendment (SPA) number RI-22-0025, submitted on December 29, 2022, with additional information received on March 30, 2023, has been approved. This SPA has an effective date of October 1, 2022, and is a companion to the Medicaid continuous postpartum and lawfully residing pregnant individuals coverage SPA, RI-22-0024.

The retroactive effective date is interesting.

Through this SPA, Rhode Island provides 12 months of continuous postpartum coverage to individuals enrolled in its separate CHIP, pursuant to section 9822 of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARP). Section 9822 of the ARP added section 2107(e)(1)(J) to the Social Security Act (the Act), which requires states to provide continuous eligibility throughout an individual’s pregnancy and 12-month postpartum period in CHIP if the state has elected this option in Medicaid. In Rhode Island, this provision applies to targeted low-income individuals who are pregnant. A copy of the approved CS27 state plan page is attached to be incorporated into the state’s approved CHIP state plan.

Although the state plan template indicates that this provision sunsets on March 31, 2027, section 5113 of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023 eliminated the sunset date and made the option permanent. If the state would like to eliminate extended postpartum coverage in the future, it should submit a new state plan amendment. RI-22-0025 also expands CHIP coverage to otherwise eligible lawfully residing pregnant individuals under section 214 of the Children's Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2009, as implemented through section 2107(e)(1)(O) of the Act. A copy of the approved CS18 state plan page is attached to be incorporated into the state's approved CHIP state plan. This page supersedes the previous CS18 that was approved on March 5, 2014.

I have no idea why the administration hasn't put out a formal standalone press release about this...they've done so for nearly every other state to my knowledge (including Oklahoma last month), but whatever; it's still good news!