COLUMBIA, S.C. (WIS) – A new study found around 340,000 South Carolinians could benefit if the state expands Medicaid eligibility.

South Carolina is one of 10 states that have not opted to do so since expansion became an option about a decade ago for the government-funded program that provides health coverage to lower-income Americans.

Nearly half a million South Carolinians were uninsured in 2022, about one in 10 people in the state, but researchers believe that figure is likely higher now than it was two years ago.

The new report was commissioned by Cover SC, a group of nearly 200 nonprofits and stakeholders interested in closing the healthcare gap in South Carolina.

It aims to show the benefits of Medicaid expansion, long considered something of a third rail at the Republican-dominated State House.

“We need to improve health outcomes in South Carolina. We know Medicaid expansion will do that,” Cover SC Coalition Chair Teresa Arnold said.

The study claims expanding Medicaid could benefit not only South Carolina’s health outcomes but also its economy.

It estimates around 29,000 new jobs would be created across all 46 counties, attributing that to Medicaid dollars going to healthcare providers and spreading out from there.

“If they’re employed, typically speaking, they’re better off. They’re able to meet their mortgage. They’re able to help their children go to school and meet all those bills. So there are other economic goods that ripple through,” Leighton Ku, the study’s lead author, said.

The report claimed South Carolina would gain more than $8 billion in federal funds in the first three years of expansion, with the amount of money the state would need to put in offset by federal bonus funding.

“Because South Carolina has not been expanding Medicaid when it’s had the opportunity for the past decade, South Carolina taxpayers have essentially lost a billion dollars in federal funds every year,” Ku, the director of the Center for Health Policy Research at George Washington University’s Milken Institute School of Public Health, said. “South Carolina taxpayers are paying their taxes, and they are essentially subsidizing Medicaid expansion in other states.”

But it’s unlikely South Carolina will seriously consider this action anytime soon.

A provision in the new state budget would have formed a committee to study healthcare reforms this year, including taking a legitimate look for the first time at Medicaid expansion.

A spokesman for Republican Gov. Henry McMaster said he remains unconvinced about the findings of reports like this one.

McMaster vetoed the study committee while acknowledging a need to improve access to quality, affordable healthcare.

“I believe that studying and working toward the goal is worthy, but a five-month study committee, I think, would not produce the kind of results and may actually slow us down,” McMaster told reporters after issuing his vetoes.

Meanwhile, the governor’s office claims the state’s share of expanding Medicaid would cost more than $2.6 billion over the next decade, with the annual cost rising to more than $380 million by the 10th year.

It notes that the amount is more than some state agencies, like the Department of Mental Health and the Department of Social Services, will receive in this year’s budget to stay operational.

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