State nets $1.3M federal grant Money allotted for expanding public health care, research

AUGUSTA – Maine has been awarded a federal grant worth nearly $1.3 million to finance a study of ways to expand access to health care.

The state Department of Human Services will work with the Muskie School of Public Service to assess potential initiatives.

One initiative to be studied is a small-business health coverage plan that was successfully advanced in the Legislature by House Speaker Michael Saxl.

“Just as we need to be innovative in finding ways to ensure access to quality health care for all Maine people, we also must be proactive in seeking financial support for those efforts from sources other than the state’s General Fund,” Saxl said Wednesday in a statement.

“Because we were able to find grant money to get the small-business health plan, we can be assured that it will not be a victim of our current fiscal situation,” Saxl said.

Maine received the health research and planning grant from the federal Health Resources and Services Administration, part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Officials said Maine received the largest of 11 grants awarded this year to states designing programs to reduce the number of people without health insurance.

“One of the criteria for the grant was the degree to which each state has developed successful initiatives regarding public health,” Maine Human Services Commissioner Kevin Concannon said.

“Here in Maine, we have reduced our rate of teen pregnancy to one of the lowest in the country; we have reduced youth smoking 36 percent in the past four years; we have designed and implemented the Healthy Maine Prescriptions Program, one of the most effective discount initiatives in the country,” Concannon said.

Last month, the state Department of Human Services announced that more than 200,000 Maine people now receive health insurance coverage through Medicaid and Cub Care, the state’s health care program for low-income families now known as MaineCare.