Medicaid: Only 19,000 Wisconsinites who lost coverage purchased plans on the federal exchange

MADISON (AP) — Newly released numbers by the state Insurance Commissioner's office shows that nearly 166,000 Wisconsin residents purchased health insurance by June 1.

But it's not known how many of those people were previously uninsured.

Gov. Scott Walker has promised to cut in half the number of uninsured people in Wisconsin, which stood at about 556,000 in March.

Of the 166,000 people, nearly 134,000 became covered through plans purchased on the federal exchange.

Deputy Insurance Commissioner Dan Schwartzer said Wednesday while it's not known how many of them didn't have insurance before, he believes the state is well on the way toward meeting Walker's goals.

Other new figures show only about 19,000 Medicaid recipients out of about 63,000 who lost their coverage this year purchased private plans on the exchange.

That has state Democrats speaking out.

Senate Democratic Leader Chris Larson issued the following statement on Wednesday, July 16th:

“Needlessly denying our families and neighbors the security of health care is simply unethical.  Whether intentional or not, Walker’s experiment is having real-world damage on thousands of our neighbors and preventing them from pursuing happy, healthy, and productive lives. 

The enrollment numbers released today clearly show that Walker and legislative Republicans cavalierly and unnecessarily kicked thousands of Wisconsinites off of their BadgerCare.  It is time for Walker and legislative Republicans to admit that their self-serving experiment is not working and accept federal relief that will cover more of our neighbors, save us money, and create jobs. 

Senate Democrats, along with communities across our state, continue to call for Wisconsin Republicans to make the common-sense decision to bring our federal funds back to Wisconsin and provide access to health care.  It is not too late for Walker and Senate Republicans to say ‘yes’ to health care security for Wisconsinites and ‘no’ to extreme partisan experiments.  I urge them to reverse course immediately.”