INSTITUTE INDEX: Support for Medicaid expansion grows in the South

Date on which the North Carolina NAACP held a mock funeral in Raleigh to protest North Carolina politicians' refusal to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act: 10/20/2014

Number of caskets protesters carried through the city streets to the General Assembly to dramatize the deaths that will occur as a result of that policy: 3

Number of North Carolinians expected to die this year alone because of the Republican-led legislature's rejection of Medicaid expansion: 2,800

Number of North Carolinians who now lack health insurance but who would get coverage under Medicaid expansion: more than 500,000

Days after the protest that state House Speaker and U.S. Senate candidate Thom Tillis, who has faced criticism for his outspoken opposition to Medicaid from Democratic incumbent Sen. Kay Hagan, said the state should consider expanding the program: 1

Year in which Tillis ran political ads bragging that he "stopped Obama's Medicaid expansion cold": 2014

Percent of the cost of Medicaid expansion that would be paid for by the federal government through 2017: 100

Percent of the cost that would be paid for by the federal government thereafter: 90

Amount North Carolina hospitals stand to lose in reimbursements over the next decade as a result of rejecting expansion: $11.3 billion

Amount North Carolina would lose in Medicaid funding over that same period: $39.6 billion

Total amount that the 24 states refusing Medicaid expansion would lose in federal funds through 2022: about $423 billion

Of those 24 non-expansion states, number that are in the South: 10

Number of Southern states that have agreed to expand Medicaid coverage to date: 3*

According to a poll conducted last month, percent of likely North Carolina voters who support Medicaid expansion: 57

Percent who oppose it: 28

* Arkansas, Kentucky, and West Virginia

(Click on figure to go to source.)