Patients have their blood pressure checked and other vital signs taken during admission triage at a Remote Area Medical mobile dental and medical clinic in Grundy, Virginia, on Oct. 7, 2023. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON – All 50 states have requested the $50 billion Rural Health Transformation Program in the Republicans’ “big, beautiful” bill, the (*50*) for Medicare and Medicaid Services said Thursday.
States had from September 15th until Wednesday to apply for the program, which was approved according to Mega tax and spending cuts package passed by Republicans and signed legally by President Donald Trump. The fund is intended to offset the budget impact on rural areas due to sweeping cuts to Medicaid.
But the ephemeral fund could only offset a little more than a third of the package’s estimated $137 billion in cuts to federal Medicaid spending in rural areas over the next decade, according to the nonpartisan health research organization KFF.
The Administrator of the (*50*) for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Dr. Mehmet Oz, in a statement Thursday alongside the announcement, said the program “takes us from a system that has too often failed in rural America to one based on dignity, prevention and sustainability.”
Oz said, “Each state with an approved application will receive funding to help them design what works best for their communities – and CMS will be there to provide support every step of the way.”
Each state was asked to “design a plan to transform its rural health care system” and propose how it will “expand access, improve quality and improve patient outcomes through sustainable, state-led innovation.”
The program provides $25 billion equally to approved states between fiscal years 2026 and 2030. CMS said states that meet the baseline criteria will then be subject to “a rigorous, data-driven performance review” for the remaining half of the funds.
In September, when Announcement of the opening of applicationsAccording to CMS, the remaining half of the funding would be administered to approved states based on “individual state metrics and applications that reflect the greatest potential and magnitude of impact on the health of rural communities.”
Approved awardees will be notified by Dec. 31, according to CMS.
