MD Extended Open Enrollment Aims to Reach More Uninsured – Public News Service

People in Maryland have one more week to sign up for health insurance coverage through the state-run insurance marketplace, and advocates are hoping to get more Charles County residents to do it.

The Maryland Health Connection has extended open enrollment through Feb. 28 due to the pandemic, one of the few states to do so. Nearly 5% of Charles County residents are uninsured, according to U.S. Census data.

Dr. Dianna Abney, Charles County health officer, said behavioral health and cardiovascular disease are major concerns, and being insured can help people address them.

“And you’ll have access to someone who can help guide you through your medical care, and help guide you through your health care,” Abney explained. “Not just fixing problems when they occur, but making sure that problems are prevented.”

Nine out of 10 Marylanders who enroll can receive financial help to pay for their coverage, with some premiums as low as $1 per month, according to county officials. Since open enrollment started in November, about 3,000 Charles County residents have signed up for health insurance.

This year’s Black History Month theme is “Black Health and Wellness.”

Angela French-Bell, vice president of the Charles County NAACP, said the theme helps draw attention to the health challenges Black Marylanders have faced during the pandemic.

“This is the third year of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has disproportionately impacted minority communities and placed unique burdens on Black healthcare professionals,” French-Bell pointed out. “For us, health equity is important, and an important part of that is removing obstacles to health care.”

The number of Black residents enrolled in Maryland Health Connection plans has grown by more than 10% this year, according to state health officials.

get more stories like this via email

Ongoing research studies at a Philadelphia medical school are focusing on stress-reduction interventions for health care workers experiencing burnout exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dr. Daniel Monti, chair of the department of integrative medicine and nutritional sciences at Thomas Jefferson University and The Marcus Institute of Integrative Health, said the eight-week virtual program teaches mindfulness and meditation, which can be helpful for health care workers who have been inundated by grief and illness during the pandemic.

Monti explained it is not about replacing psychiatry but providing tools to alleviate the lingering effects of stress and anxiety.

“Many of us, we’re in that middle zone, where it isn’t that it was an acute clinical diagnosis, but the stress affects people,” Monti pointed out. “It’s been highly rewarding working with health care workers. We know what a difficult job they have, and we want to support them and help them in any way we can.”

Previous studies have shown mindfulness strategies can be effective in fostering resiliency and recovery in health care workers during the pandemic. Due to stressors and high workloads related to COVID-19, a 2021 study predicted Pennsylvania will be short nearly 300,000 health care workers by 2026.

Monti noted Jefferson also offers mindfulness programs to the general public. After nearly two years into the pandemic, the social isolation and difficult decisions people have had to make to keep themselves and others safe have taken a toll.

“Stress, in a way, is an exacerbation of the fight-or-flight mechanisms of the nervous system,” Monti remarked. “That fight-or-flight mechanism is meant to be temporary until whenever the perceived threat to survival passes. However, in a pandemic, it never goes away.”

Through meditation practices, participants can learn to reduce the physical effects of long-term stress, along with ways to better communicate strong feelings such as anger. Jefferson’s integrative medicine academic department is the first of its kind in the country.

get more stories like this via email

A hearing will be held today on a bill which would ban gender-affirming health care for transgender youth. The Save Adolescents from Experimentation Act, also called the SAVE Act, would ban Ohio doctors from prescribing puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgeries to those younger than age 18.

Proponents argued vulnerable youths confused about their gender are becoming the subjects of irreversible and drastic procedures.

Eliana Turan, board member of the LGBT Community Center of Greater Cleveland and a transgender woman, said they are pushing a false narrative of youths in crisis.

“Let’s say you’re a 16-year-old old trans kid. In most cases, you’re not going to be walking into a doctor’s office and then walking out with a bunch of irreversible body modifications,” Turan contended. “That’s just simply not the standards of care in Ohio. I don’t think anyone’s trying to push for that.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends gender-affirming medical care for transgender youths. The SAVE Act will have its first hearing with proponent testimony in the Families, Aging, and Human Services Committee.

Maria Bruno, public policy director for Equality Ohio, said such a ban would take control away from doctors, counselors and parents, and would harm the mental well-being of transgender and nonbinary youth.

“The basic premise is that trans youth are just in a phase that they will grow out of,” Bruno explained. “That is just not how the science and the research shows this to work. Actually, trans-affirming medical care decreases suicidal ideations.”

The SAVE Act has two sponsors and two dozen co-sponsors, all Republican. Turan asserted as an Ohioan, she believes elected officials should be focusing on important issues.

“As a military veteran who served for six years in uniform during the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ era, this is not an example of the freedom and protection that I worked so hard to afford to my neighbors,” Turan remarked. “It certainly isn’t the way that we should be treating our trans neighbors. “

An Arkansas ban passed last year is temporarily paused pending a legal challenge. Similar bills have been introduced in more than 30 other states.

Reporting by Ohio News Connection in association with Media in the Public Interest and funded in part by the George Gund Foundation.

get more stories like this via email

Gov. Gavin Newsom got a six-foot-tall Valentine Monday, thanking him for putting Medi-Cal access for undocumented people into his latest budget proposal.

Advocates brought a giant heart-shaped card to the Capitol, covered in letters from dozens of Californians.

Beatriz Hernandez, Central Valley organizing fellow with the California Immigrant Policy Center, said right now, hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants can only get emergency Medi-Cal coverage.

“They can’t just go to any regular visit to the doctor, like you and I,” Hernandez explained. “They can only access care if their lives are at risk in an emergency.”

Gov. Newsom’s proposal would open full-scale Medi-Cal coverage to income-eligible undocumented adults between ages 26 and 49. In recent years, the state has expanded eligibility to undocumented children, seniors and young adults. Opponents of the program cite concerns about cost.

The state Legislative Analyst’s Office said the proposal would cover another 700,000 people and cost the state $2.2 billion a year, if implemented starting in 2024.

Hernandez noted it would make California the first state in the nation to offer health care for all.

“It’s putting California in the front and center, and to show the rest of the nation that this is something that can be done,” Hernandez asserted. “This is what an equitable state can look like when people in power do the right thing.”

Sen. Maria Elena Durazo, D- Los Angeles, and Asm. Joaquin Arambula, D-Fresno, both supporters of the “Health4All” campaign, also signed the card. The California Legislature has until June to approve a budget.

get more stories like this via email