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The latest on the Key Bridge collapse, New York puts forth legislation to get clean energy projects on the grid and Wisconsin and other states join a federal summer food program to help feed kids across the country.

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Republicans float conspiracy theories on the collapse of Baltimore's Key Bridge, South Carolina's congressional elections will use a map ruled unconstitutional, and the Senate schedules an impeachment trial for Homeland Secretary Mayorkas.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

Thousands to Lose Health Coverage if Affordable Care Act is Repealed

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Wednesday, December 14, 2016   

BALTIMORE, Md. – Congress is considering repealing parts of the Affordable Care Act, a plan that a new report suggests would double the number of uninsured people in Maryland and other states. The Urban Institute research shows that in Maryland, more than 340,000 children and adults would lose coverage.

Joan Alker, the executive director of the Center for Children and Families at Georgetown University said because of the ACA, 95 percent of children in the U.S. now have health insurance.

"But now, Congress is poised to take a U-turn and taking away affordable coverage options, which would actually double the number of uninsured kids," she said.

Senate Republicans have said rolling back the law would have few impacts on the number of people without health insurance. But the report shows that nearly 30 million Americans would lose coverage.

Alker said there is a lot of misinformation about who would be most impacted. She explained that it's not just those who are low-income.

"Eighty-two percent of those losing coverage would be in working families," she explained. "The majority of those are non-Hispanic whites and 80 percent of the adults becoming uninsured would not have college degrees."

Alker added that repeal would also cause chaos in state budgets.

"Families' health-care needs won't disappear if their coverage goes away," cautioned Alker. "And the responsibility for responding to that will fall squarely into the states' lap and we'll have huge gaps in our health-care safety net."

The report also found that the individual insurance market would be severely disrupted and the share of people under age 65 without insurance would increase from 11 percent to 21 percent. That's higher than it was before the ACA.


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