Contact: Jon Whiten, NJPP: 917-655-3313 (cell) | whiten@njpp.org

As Senate Republicans prepare to unveil their version of legislation to repeal the Affordable Care Act after weeks of working on it in secret, a new analysis released today shows the current standard-bearer – the House-passed American Health Care Act (AHCA) – would have devastating consequences to New Jersey’s residents, public health and economy.

The House-passed bill would strip insurance from 540,000 New Jerseyans and cause the state’s uninsurance rate to spike by 50 percent by 2026, according to the new report by New Jersey Policy Perspective (NJPP). 

In addition, the repeal of the Medicaid expansion and subsidies in the marketplace alone in the AHCA would result in a $28 billion loss in federal funds over 10 years and cut about 54,000 jobs, causing irreparable harm to New Jersey’s health, budget and economy. The bill would also cause tremendous increases in premiums for many New Jerseyans, as well as put them at risk of losing key consumer protections. 

“Given the incredible harm the House-passed bill would do to states around the country, it’s alarming that the Senate appears to be adopting most of the major provisions,” said Raymond Castro, Director of Health Policy at New Jersey Policy Perspective and author of the report. “It would more than reverse the historic progress that New Jersey has made in securing coverage for hundreds of thousands under the Affordable Care Act. This is a big step backward for the health of New Jerseyans and Americans overall.”

The coverage, federal funding and job losses would be severe in every single New Jersey Congressional district, NJPP’s analysis finds. Coverage loss ranges from 30,000-65,000; percentage increase in the uninsured ranges 44 to 112 percent; annual federal funding lost ranges from $251 million to $638 million; and job loss ranges from 2,761 to 7,006.

“This new analysis makes abundantly clear that even calling the House-passed bill a ‘health bill’ at all is a bit misleading,” said Jon Whiten, Vice President of NJPP. “This legislation will do a lot of things – chiefly make New Jersey’s wealthiest taxpayers much, much wealthier while stripping affordable coverage from many of the rest of us – but there’s no way it will improve the health of New Jerseyans.”

To read the full report: https://www.njpp.org/healthcare/house-passed-health-bill-would-end-coverage-for-more-than-half-a-million-new-jerseyans