The NHHF has continued to meet with health care leaders, coalitions and policymakers on the following key policies that will impact the health of our communities.
Affordable Care Act Health (ACA) Insurance Coverage to Decrease for 11M Americans –
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act highlights the importance of defunding Medicaid by $1 trillion by decreasing matching funds and provider taxes for State Medicaid programs and adding work requirements of 80 hours in the month prior to application. Starting this week, DACA recipients have also been excluded from federal health insurance. According to the 2024 Health Interview Survey, one third of adult Hispanics were uninsured at some point.
Many more Americans could lose insurance because the ACA tax credits to low-income Americans, established by the American Rescue Plan of 2021 and extended by the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, are about to expire this year. If this policy is not extended by the Trump Administration, an enrollee making 166% of poverty or $26,000/year could see a spike of 573% or $76/month or an enrollee making 400% of poverty or $65,000/year could have a premium increase of $941/month. (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2024 analysis)
Access and Affordability Health Care Policies Needed
Dr. Rios, NHHF president, works with health care coalitions to educate policymakers on strategies for all to have more access to health and behavioral care, low premium insurance, women’s reproductive care, Medicare obesity disease coverage for counseling and medications, Medicare Advantage rate reform, clinical trial research for innovative medicines, and more. We support cultural and language services especially to increase health insurance enrollment, health education reimbursement, 340B medication discount program for the poor, and policies that continue to increase medication affordability and innovation.
Health Professional Workforce Policies under Attack
Given the critical shortage of doctors and nurses, NHHF supports federal policy development for higher education to expand medical education focused on training in underserved urban and rural communities. A major way to do this is to focus on supporting pathways and automatic admissions for STEM students from underserved communities to healthcare professional schools with regional sites in underserved communities.
We actively work with the AAMC HPNEC Coalition with major health professional organizations to educate Congressmembers and Senators to maintain the federal funding at FY25 for Title VII (HCOP, COE, Scholarships) in order to increase recruitment of doctors, public health, and others. Policies that address the critical shortage of doctors and nurses include:
- Senate FY26 appropriations calls for maintaining these diversity programs and we thank them
- The OBBB caps on student/parent federal loans will close the door to low-income students from health workforce careers
- The Supreme Court abolished affirmative action based on race resulted in a major decrease of students of color accessing higher education
Hispanic-Serving Institutions Grant Programs Lawsuit
The Students for Fair Admissions (whose last lawsuit resulted with the Supreme Court abolishing affirmative action in 2023) have a new lawsuit calling for defunding federal grants for Hispanic-Serving Institutions’ (must have 25% Hispanic students) that was recently joined by Tennessee that shares the stance that federal education funds should help all students, despite a 2023 Urban Institute study that found that all students at these colleges are educated through these grant innovative training programs.
We are also championing key pieces of legislation:
- The Treatment and Reduction of Obesity Act (TROA) – to increase access to obesity counseling and treatment coverage under Medicare.
- The Diversity in Clinical Trials Modernization Act – to guarantee that Hispanic
researchers and patients are included in lifesaving research and innovation. - Preserving Public Health and Prevention Programs – which are under threat of cuts,
even as communities continue to face chronic disease, mental health crises, and pandemic recovery needs. - Research Funding at NIH – where sustained and equitable investment is essential to
advancing knowledge and closing disparities in Hispanic health.