Halfway through Virginia’s review of whether millions of Medicaid enrollees are still eligible for coverage after the pandemic, nearly 160,000 Virginians have lost coverage — roughly 15% of the over 1 million members whose cases have been reviewed so far.
For the past three years, anyone who was enrolled in Medicaid was allowed to keep their coverage regardless of whether or not they still met eligibility requirements like income level. Now that the COVID-19 federal public health emergency is over, the Department of Medical Assistance Services is carrying out a redetermination — or “unwinding” — process to decide which members no longer qualify.