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GHF legislative update: January 27

LEGISLATIVE UPDATE: WEEK 2

Severe Weather Closed the State Capitol for Most of the Week 

Severe weather disrupted last week’s legislative schedule, postponing budget hearings and other activities. As a result, some state agencies will now present their budget requests this week. Since there wasn’t much action at the Capitol last week, we’ve covered a few more health-related bills from the first week of session below. 

Update on State Agency Budget Presentations:

State agency budget presentations now begin this week. For the latest schedule, check out the legislative session schedule here. Two upcoming meetings on our radar are: 

Pathways to Coverage Waiver Renewal: Public Comment Opportunity

The Georgia Department of Community Health released the Pathways to Coverage waiver renewal application on January 21st. This release kicks off a short public comment period that ends on February 20th–and we will be asking you to comment! Governor Kemp suggested that Pathways could serve as a national model during his State of the State address. However, experts, advocates, and others continue to demonstrate that the program lacks accessibility, and is expensive and ineffective.

Launched in July 2023, Pathways to Coverage (a.k.a. “Pathways”) is a new Medicaid program designed for some low-income adults. Pathways requires participants to meet strict paperwork requirements to document that they are completing certain work or other activities to maintain their coverage. State officials initially projected that 30,000 individuals would enroll during the program’s first year. Eighteen months later, fewer than 6,500 Georgians are enrolled, indicating eligible participants are having problems enrolling and participating. 

Key Issues with Pathways to Coverage:

  • Administrative hurdles: The program imposes complex paperwork requirements, making enrolling and maintaining coverage difficult for eligible Georgians
  • Limited impact: Pathways reaches a fraction (3%) of those who could benefit from full Medicaid expansion
  • High costs: The program is five times more expensive per person than traditional Medicaid expansion despite covering fewer individuals.


How You Can Help: The Pathways public comment period allows Georgians to make their voices heard and urge state leaders to remove barriers and expand eligibility for our low-income friends, neighbors, and loved ones.

If you would like to stay up to date on how to provide public comments in response to the renewal of Pathways, please sign up for updates from the Cover Georgia Coalition.


Legislation on Our Radar

HB 81: Interstate Compact for School Psychologists

  • Position: Support
  • Status: House First Readers (1/17/2025)
  • Sponsor: Representative Bethany Ballard
  • Summary: HB 81 would allow Georgia to join the Interstate Compact for School Psychologists. This compact makes it easier for school psychologists to work in different states by simplifying the licensing process. It also helps address the shortage of these professionals in schools. The bill creates a commission to manage the compact. It also sets rules for sharing information, handling discipline issues (for school psychologists, not students), solving disputes, and how states can join or leave the compact. The goal is to give students better access to school psychologists while still allowing each state to set its own licensure requirements.
  • Why It Matters: Improves access to mental health support for students and helps tackle the shortage of school psychologists.

HB 89: Requires health care providers, health care facilities, and pharmacies to provide the Maternal Mortality Review Committee with psychiatric or other clinical records

  • Position: Monitoring
  • Status: House First Readers (1/17/2025)
  • Sponsor: Representative Sharon Cooper
  • Summary: HB 89 aims to improve how the state of Georgia collects information on maternal deaths and provides care for mothers and babies. It gives the Maternal Mortality Review Committee more access to patient records, including mental health and pharmacy records, to better understand why mothers pass away during pregnancy or childbirth. The bill also creates a Regional Perinatal Center Advisory Committee, which will help make sure hospitals and doctors have the right resources to care for high-risk pregnancies and births. Lastly, the bill simplifies the process for investigating the deaths of pregnant women, so medical examiners don’t always have to go through a regional perinatal center unless special circumstances require it.
  • Why It Matters: Helps identify systemic issues in maternal health care, improving outcomes for mothers and babies.

HB 94: Requires health insurers to cover fertility preservation services for individuals undergoing treatment for cancer, sickle cell disease, or lupus that may impact fertility

  • Position: Monitoring
  • Status: House Hopper (1/17/2025)
  • Sponsor: Representative Eddie Lumsden
  • Summary: HB 94 would require state-regulated health plans to cover fertility preservation services for people undergoing medical treatments for cancer, sickle cell disease, or lupus that could lead to infertility. These services include procedures like freezing eggs, sperm, or embryos to help individuals have children in the future. The bill also sets guidelines and limits for what insurance must cover, such as evaluation costs, medications, and one year of storage for reproductive cells. Limits include restrictions based on age and the number of procedures covered.
  • Why It Matters: If passed, this bill would help people facing serious illnesses more affordably protect their ability to have children while ensuring insurance companies have clear and consistent guidelines.

HB 97: “Private option” version of Medicaid expansion

  • Position: Support
  • Status: House Hopper (1/17/2025)
  • Sponsor: Representative Sam Park
  • Summary: HB 97 would create a new coverage option for low-income Georgians ages 19-65 with incomes at or below 138% of the federal poverty level (FPL). Eligible Georgians would enroll in a health plan through Georgia Access (the state-run website where people can sign up for private health insurance). Under this program, the state would fully cover premiums and other costs for enrollees.
  • What You Should Know:
    • For 2024, 138% of the FPL is about $20,000 per year for a single person or $41,000 for a family of four.
    • Currently, some low-income Georgians have $0 premiums through Georgia Access due to enhanced premium tax credits (ePTCs). However, these are set to expire at the end of 2025 unless extended by Congress.
  • Why It Matters: If passed, HB 97 would enable more than 200,000 Georgians to get affordable health coverage, reducing the number of uninsured people in the state. With health insurance, low-income adults who currently fall into the coverage gap could go to the doctor when they’re sick, access medications to keep them healthy, and have much better access to health care.

HB 101: Annual reporting requirement for the amount of prescription drug rebates applied to premium reductions for the State Health Benefit Plan

  • Position: Support
  • Status: House Hopper (1/17/2025)
  • Sponsor: Representative Demetrius Douglas
  • Summary: HB 101 would require yearly public reports on prescription drug discounts and savings (i.e., prescription drug rebates) for the state employees’ health insurance plan, which covers state workers and public school teachers. The report would show how much of the savings from these drug discount programs was used to reduce premiums in the State Health Benefit Plan. The savings would be detailed in both dollar amounts and percentages. The bill also removes any outdated laws that might conflict with these changes.
  • Why It Matters: HB 101 aims to ensure that savings the company that manages prescription drug benefits for the SHBP receives are passed along to public employees and teachers.

HB 104: Equal Athletic Opportunities Act (House version of the Senate’s proposed ban on transgender athletes)

  • Position: Oppose
  • Status: House Hopper (1/17/2025)
  • Sponsor: Representative Brent Cox
  • Summary: HB 104 would ban transgender students in middle school through college from participating in school sports that align with their gender identity.    The bill bans transgender students from using shared spaces, such as bathrooms or locker rooms, based on their gender identity. The bill would also legally define “sex” as a student’s biological sex, as defined by their birth certificate.
  • Why it matters:The bill’s reliance on biological sex as determined at birth effectively excludes transgender students from participating in teams that align with their gender identity. Not only is this discriminatory, but studies show that this type of exclusion causes significant mental harm to transgender adolescents and their families. Additionally, the bill proposes to penalize schools by withholding state funding if schools have policies that do not adhere precisely to the bill’s intent.

HB 109: EmPATH unit pilot program

  • Position: Monitoring
  • Status: House Hopper (1/17/2025)
  • Sponsor: Representative Imani Barnes
  • Summary: HB 109 proposes a five-year pilot program to create Emergency Psychiatric Assessment, Treatment, and Healing (EmPATH) units in hospitals across Georgia. These units are designed to help people experiencing mental health crises by providing immediate, short-term treatment in a hospital-based setting. The goal is to offer an alternative to emergency rooms and inpatient hospitalization for individuals in crisis.
  • Why It Matters: The EmPATH pilot program could help ease emergency room overcrowding, improve mental health outcomes, and expand access to care in urban and rural areas by creating dedicated crisis care facilities. If the pilot is successful, the EmPATH units could be implemented on a larger scale, leading to a long-term shift in how Georgia handles individuals experiencing mental health emergencies.

Advocate with us at the Capitol!

Join These Advocacy Events During the Legislative Session

Each week during the legislative session, we’ll highlight legislative advocacy days hosted by partner organizations. These events are excellent opportunities to engage in the lawmaking process by meeting your legislators and advocating for critical health issues.

Here are the upcoming events:

Please contact Anthony Hill at ahill@healthyfuturega.org if you have an advocacy event you’d like included in GHF’s legislative update.

We hope to see you at one or more of these impactful events!


GHF has you covered!

Stay up-to-date with the legislative session
 

GHF will be monitoring legislative activity on a number of critical consumer health care topics. Along with our weekly legislative updates and timely analysis of bills, here are tools to help you stay in touch with health policy under the Gold Dome.


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