ATLANTA, GA – Starting August 25, 2025, a provision of the federal Marketplace Integrity and Affordability final rule will go into effect that strips Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients of their eligibility to enroll in marketplace health coverage. There are about 17,700 DACA recipients in Georgia who will become ineligible to purchase a plan on the exchange and, in some cases, lose their current coverage. Georgia Access is required to disenroll current DACA enrollees by the end of September.

The Final Rule will have significant impacts on Georgia’s State-Based Health Insurance Marketplace (SBM). Georgia Access, now the second-largest SBM in the country, enrolled over 1.5 million Georgians in its first year of operation, including about 225,000 new consumers. These numbers reflect the program’s importance as a primary access point for health coverage in the state.

Under this policy change, Georgia Access will no longer recognize DACA recipients as “lawfully present,” cutting them off from marketplace enrollment. Starting August 25, the state will block new applicants, and on September 30, it will remove current enrollees from their plans. The state will notify affected individuals, many of whom rely on this coverage to afford doctor visits, prescriptions, and other essential care.

“This change will take affordable coverage away from a group of Georgians who have built their lives here and contribute daily to our state,” said Whitney Griggs, Director of Health Policy at Georgians for a Healthy Future. “While DACA recipients likely make up a small portion of Georgia Access enrollees, this decision will have an outsized impact on their lives and communities. This change also comes at a time when other federal policy shifts will put hundreds of thousands of Georgians at risk of losing their health coverage, further destabilizing Georgia’s health system.”

ATLANTA, GA — Georgia health care and policy experts warned this week that the newly signed federal budget law threatens the health and well-being of families across the state, putting both health care access and food security at risk.

During a press briefing jointly hosted by Georgians for a Healthy Future, the Georgia Budget & Policy Institute, and the Georgia Early Education Alliance for Ready Students (GEEARS), speakers outlined how the law’s deep cuts to Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), along with stricter work requirements, will undo progress Georgia has made in expanding health coverage and reducing food insecurity.

Every Georgian deserves the freedom to see a doctor when they are sick and put healthy food on the table for their family. But experts warned that the new law undermines this basic promise. The cuts and requirements are expected to leave more Georgians uninsured, drive up health care costs, increase food hardship, and strain hospitals, early childhood programs, and safety-net providers.

Speakers called on state leaders to use Georgia’s resources wisely to protect families from falling through the cracks and to ensure no one is forced to choose between paying for medical care and buying groceries.

Whitney Griggs, Director of Health Policy at Georgians for a Healthy Future, explained how the changes to the Affordable Care Act will lead to more uninsured Georgians, higher costs, and added strain on hospitals.

“Georgia Access enrolled more than 1.5 million people in 2025, second only to California, because plans are affordable and enrollment is simple,” said Griggs. “With over 90 percent of enrollees relying on subsidies, the budget bill’s ACA changes could strip coverage from up to 700,000 Georgians unless state leaders act.”

Supreme Court Preserves Life-Saving Preventive Care for 5 Million Georgians

Historic ruling protects no-cost access to cancer screenings, HIV prevention, and mental health services.

ATLANTA – Georgians for a Healthy Future celebrates today’s landmark Supreme Court decision in Kennedy v. Braidwood Management that preserves access to no-cost preventive healthcare services for over 5 million Georgians with private insurance.

“This decision protects what works,” said Laura Colbert, Executive Director of Georgians for a Healthy Future. “Since 2010, these services have helped catch cancers early, prevented maternal deaths, and kept Georgia families healthy while saving money for everyone.”

What This Means for Georgia Families: The ruling ensures Georgians will continue receiving essential preventive services without out-of-pocket costs, including:

• Lung cancer screenings for current and former smokers
• Colorectal cancer screenings for adults under age 50
• Mental health and substance use screenings for all ages
• Medication to prevent heart disease in adults 
• Using low-cost, effective medication to treat pregnant women at risk of preeclampsia

Georgia’s Unique Stakes: The decision is particularly significant for Georgia’s vulnerable communities. Communities of color, who face higher rates of preventable diseases, maintain access to early intervention services that catch conditions before they become costly and life-threatening. With Georgia ranking 38th nationally in overall health outcomes, preserving access to preventive care is crucial for improving population health.

ATLANTA, GA — Early this morning, the U.S. House passed a sweeping budget proposal that threatens to dismantle key components of Georgia’s health care system. The proposal, which includes the largest cuts to Medicaid in the program’s 60-year history, would upend coverage and care for hundreds of thousands of Georgians and put immense pressure on rural hospitals and already-strained state health resources.

Georgians for a Healthy Future (GHF) has released a new blog outlining how the proposal would harm Georgia’s Medicaid program, the ACA Marketplace/Georgia Access, and Georgia families.

Read the blog here.

“Health care is one of the most basic building blocks of a thriving Georgia. This budget proposal would rip coverage away from 160,000 Georgians, leaving our state sicker. Families with young children, seniors, and people with disabilities will struggle with gaps in coverage and higher medical costs. Rural communities will be at higher risk of losing their local hospitals,” said Laura Colbert, Executive Director of Georgians for a Healthy Future. “Georgians have seen firsthand that work requirements don’t work. They’re simply paperwork penalties that leave more Georgians without the care they need. At a time when we should be investing in better care and closing Georgia’s coverage gap, the U.S. House has advanced a plan that moves us backward. Georgians deserve a health system that adequately meets their needs, not one dismantled for the sake of tax cuts for ultra-wealthy Americans. ”

ATLANTA, GA — Georgia’s limited Medicaid program with work reporting requirements has underperformed on every front, and now the federal government is asking the public to weigh in on whether the state’s troubled program should be extended through 2030.

Launched in July 2023, the Pathways to Coverage program was designed to offer Medicaid coverage to low-income adults who could document and verify 80 hours of work, job training, volunteering, or other government-approved activity each month. A majority of potentially eligible Georgians are either employed themselves or are in a household with at least one worker. Yet, even those who meet the program criteria face a steep ‘paperwork’ burden.

Supporters call the program a bridge to health care and employment. But data from the program’s first year shows a different story:

• Only 7,000 people are enrolled. That’s just 3% of the number of uninsured Georgians with qualifying incomes.
• Of the more than 110,000 Georgians who indicated interest in applying to the program in the first year, only about 5% were able to navigate the full application process and enroll in the program.
• Georgia’s Pathways program has cost nearly $92 million in total funding (a little more than $13,000 per enrollee), with much of it going to administrative expenses like technology upgrades, not health care.

Now, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is reviewing Georgia’s request to extend Pathways and is accepting public comments through June 1. Health care advocates say the public has a critical opportunity to speak up against burdensome requirements that deny care to those who need it.

ATLANTA — Georgians for a Healthy Future issues the following statement in response to the U.S. House of Representatives passing a budget resolution that puts Medicaid funding at serious risk, and thus the health and financial security of Georgia families at serious risk:

“Medicaid provides quality health insurance for 2 million Georgians, including 41% of Georgia’s children, nearly half of all births, and three in ten people with disabilities,” said Laura Colbert, Executive Director of Georgians for a Healthy Future. “Slashing Medicaid funding would mean more parents unable to get care for their sick children, people with disabilities unable to secure the care and services they need to live, and rural hospitals pushed closer to closure.”

The House’s budget resolution lays the groundwork for harmful cuts to Medicaid. Any cuts to Medicaid would jeopardize care for children, seniors, people with disabilities, and rural communities. State leaders would be forced to reduce what services Medicaid covers for Georgians, lower already-lean payments to providers, and eventually cut back on who can qualify for Medicaid. Cuts would threaten Georgia’s already strained health care system. 

Medicaid brings in $11.4 billion in federal funding annually, keeping the doors open to hospitals and doctors’ offices across the state. It is essential to keeping Georgia families covered and healthy, our health care system functioning, and our state economy moving. 

Congress’s budget proposal pairs Medicaid cuts with proposed cuts to other programs that provide families with child care, food, and economic security. Together these changes would destabilize families and make it harder for Georgians to afford the health care, groceries, and rent that they need to thrive.

Instead of putting Georgia families at risk, Congress should strengthen and modernize Medicaid – not slash it to pay for tax breaks for the wealthy. Georgians for a Healthy Future urges Congress to reject these dangerous cuts and ensure that the final budget protects the health and well-being of Georgia families and communities.

Georgians must make their voices heard. Call Senators Ossoff and Warnock today and tell them: Protect our health care. Protect our families. Reject these harmful cuts.