Sohn: How can world’s richest country not pay for children’s health?

Dr. Jonathan Miller checks Jay Dennis, 3, at a clinic in Delaware. The Children's Health Insurance Program, or CHIP, is a victim of the partisan rancor that has stymied legislative action in Washington this year. (Mark Makela/The New York Times) Dr. Jonathan Miller checks Jay Dennis, 3, at a clinic in Delaware. The Children's Health Insurance Program, or CHIP, is a victim of the partisan rancor that has stymied legislative action in Washington this year. (Mark Makela/The New York Times)

By Pam Sohn December 29, 2017 4 min read

Before Congress adjourned for the holidays, its members passed a short-term continuing resolution to keep the government funded through Jan. 19. With that bill was a small amount of additional funding for CHIP – the Children’s Health Insurance Program.

But the short-term fix falls woefully short. In fact, at best, it will fund health care services for the 9 million children covered by CHIP only through March 2018.

Plenty of news reports contain talk about the Children’s Health Insurance Program being “popular” on both sides of the political aisles of Congress. But if that’s true, why did the funding run out on Sept. 30 and Congress fail to reauthorize a long-term appropriation for it?

The federal funding for the program is distributed to the states, and administered there. In Tennessee, it’s known as CoverKids (and a portion of TennCare). In Georgia, it’s Peachcare for Kids, and in Alabama it’s All Kids. It doesn’t just cover children from poor families. It also covers the kids in middle-class families who can’t afford the cost of their employers’ family coverage or who work where no insurance is available.

States have been warning for some time that children would lose their coverage if lawmakers didn’t act fast.