According to the latest numbers from the Louisiana Department of Health, the number of Louisianans on Medicaid has fallen to pre-pandemic levels. As of June, about 1.6-million people in Louisiana receive their health care coverage from Medicaid – that’s down more than 20% from the 2023 peak of 2 million. Public Affairs Research Council of Louisiana President Steven Procopio says the expansion started in earnest nine years ago.
“From 2016 on to about 2020, you start an expansion rate, so we went up some. Then, 2020, you have COVID,” Procopio explained.
And for the next three years following the start of the COVID pandemic, the number of people on Medicaid spiked to its peak. Procopio says that was driven in large part because while people were being added, no one was being taken off the rolls during that time.
“You couldn’t disenroll anyone from Medicaid. So if someone was on there, they hit the lottery in $100 million in the Powerball, they still couldn’t be disenrolled from Medicaid,” Procopio said.
Procopio says when eligibility checks resumed two years ago, that’s when the enrollment numbers took a huge nosedive.
“In 2023, they said okay, normal rules apply, do your eligibility checks, and then that starts to do what they call ‘the unwinding,’” Procopio said.
Still, with almost one-third of its population on Medicaid, Louisiana has one of the highest percentages of its population on Medicaid, trailing only four states and the District of Columbia.
