SCHIP focus should be on the poor, says Leavitt

The Bush administration wants a popular children's health insurance program to focus on low-income children and not become a "vehicle" for providing everyone with coverage, said U.S. Health Secretary Mike Leavitt.

States should prove that they've enrolled at least 95 percent of eligible kids in families with income less than 200 percent of the poverty level, or $41,300 for a family of four, before going after children at higher income levels, said Leavitt, secretary of the Health and Human Services Department, at a meeting Thursday with reporters.

President Bush has threatened to veto measures passed by the House and Senate this month to expand funding for the State Children's Insurance Program, known as SCHIP. If an agreement isn't reached by the end of September, the program will expire, and millions of children will lose coverage.

"Finding the low-income children who are yet to be insured is hard work, but that's the population we most need to find," Leavitt said. "They have unmet needs."

States were told by Leavitt's department on Aug. 17 that they must stop enrolling higher-income kids within 12 months unless they can prove they have covered almost all of those eligible in lower-income families. State officials say finding these children is hard and that insurance can be too expensive even for middle-class working families.

The new rules also call for states to require that kids not be covered by any insurance for one year before signing up for SchipSCHIP, an effort to prevent families from dropping private policies for cheaper government-funded insurance. Many states have a shorter waiting period or none at all.

Legislation passed by the House would add $50 billion over five years to the $25 billion SCHIP program, while a Senate- passed version would add $35 billion. The administration supports an additional $5 billion.