Beshear to Announce Medicaid Decision Today

Gov. Steve Beshear has scheduled a news conference Thursday afternoon to announce whether he will expand Kentucky's Medicaid program to cover hundreds of thousands of additional people.
 
The event is set for 1:30 p.m. EDT in the Capitol.
 
Kentucky's Medicaid program already provides medical coverage to some 800,000 people. The federal Affordable Care Act allows states to expand coverage to people with incomes up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level.
 
Beshear had been trying to pin down just how many additional Kentuckians would be eligible for coverage and how much that coverage would cost. Some estimates put the number of potential new recipients at around 300,000.
 
The federal government would fully fund the expansion for three years with the state's share gradually increasing to 10 percent by 2020.