The Ohio Academy of Family Physicians (OAFP) advocacy team monitors healthcare related legislation, rule changes, and legislative updates for Ohio’s family physicians.
To access the OAFP Bill Tracker, visit the OAFP Public Policy webpage and click on the Bill Tracker icon.
Read on for this week’s updates and contact Advocacy Coordinator Kaela Springhetti with questions or for ways to get involved.
Hamilton County Judge Blocks Ohio Law Requiring Fetal Remains to be Buried or Cremated
Source: The Columbus Dispatch
An Ohio law requiring fetal remains to be buried or cremated is unconstitutional under the state’s abortion rights amendment, a Hamilton County judge ruled recently.
Hamilton County Common Pleas Judge Alison Hatheway permanently blocked Senate Bill (SB) 27, which requires patients or abortion clinics to choose how fetal remains are disposed. The GOP-controlled Legislature passed the bill in 2020, but multiple lawsuits prevented it from going into effect.
Abortion rights groups most recently sued in 2022, over a year before Ohioans voted to enshrine reproductive rights in the state constitution. Judge Hatheway said SB 27 violates the amendment by targeting patients who seek an abortion, noting that it doesn’t apply to those who have a miscarriage.
It also does nothing to further patients’ health, Judge Hatheway argued.
“(The law) serves only to target and discriminate against individuals seeking procedural abortions and their healthcare providers,” Judge Hatheway wrote in the decision.
Read the full article in The Columbus Dispatch.
Hundreds Submit Comments Opposing Ohio’s Proposed Medicaid Work Requirements
Source: The Ohio Capital Journal
More than 400 people submitted comments opposing Ohio’s proposed Medicaid work requirements, according to records obtained by the Ohio Capital Journal.
The Ohio Department of Medicaid (ODM) received more than 450 comments on the proposed Medicaid work requirements. About 5% of the comments supported the requirements and a handful of people said they neither support or oppose the requirements, but would need more information to take a stance.
“I am disabled and unable to work,” one person said in their submitted comments. “I have major mental health issues and physical issues. Without insurance you are signing my death warrant.”
The proposed Medicaid work requirements mean more than 61,000 Ohioans could lose their health insurance according to estimates from the ODM, if the Trump Administration allows Ohio Republican state leaders to go through with their plan.
Ohio’s 2023 budget requires the state Medicaid department to re-apply with the federal government under the new presidential administration for permission to impose work, drug testing, and/or education requirements for adult Medicaid health coverage recipients.
A goal of this requirement is “promoting economic stability and financial independence,” according to the ODM.
“These changes are not only contradictory to the waiver’s stated goals, but cruel and insulting to the people who will be affected by them,” one person said in their submitted comments. “At best, this will make poor and disabled people poorer, and at worst it will kill people who no longer have access to life saving and preventive medical care.”
Read the full article in The Ohio Capital Journal.