Sponsors (23)
Official title: Amend titles XIX and XXI of the Social Security Act to enhance financial support for rural and safety net hospitals providing maternity, labor, and delivery services to vulnerable populations, and for other purposes.
Introduced June 12, 2025 by Ronald Lee Wyden · Last progress June 12, 2025
The bill substantially expands and funds maternal coverage, care continuity, and support to keep maternity services available—especially for Medicaid enrollees and rural communities—but does so at the cost of higher federal and state spending, new administrative and reporting burdens, and some financial and operational risks for providers, with several measures offering temporary rather than permanent fixes.
Pregnant people on Medicaid/CHIP gain guaranteed continuous full-benefit coverage through pregnancy and 12 months postpartum, plus faster access to prenatal care through presumptive eligibility and ambulatory prenatal services, improving maternal and postpartum care access.
Rural and low-volume hospitals, and the patients they serve, receive stronger financial supports (anchor payments, revenue floors, and enhanced FMAPs) to help keep maternity services open and make higher hospital payments more feasible.
The U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps will be expanded and funded to deploy clinicians and detail officers to maintain prenatal, delivery, and postpartum care after hospital closures, with dedicated funds to improve Corps readiness and retention.
Mandating expanded maternity coverage and higher payment floors increases federal and state Medicaid spending (including enhanced FMAPs and Corps funding), putting pressure on state budgets and federal spending priorities and potentially raising deficits or crowding out other programs.
States face substantial administrative and implementation burdens—recurring, detailed cost studies, statutory and plan changes, new reporting systems, and provider enrollment updates—within tight timelines.
Hospitals (especially small or rural facilities) will incur added administrative and operational costs to prepare community-impact and Medicare reports, meet reporting requirements, and participate in payment/anchor agreements, which could exacerbate financial strain and even accelerate closures.
Based on analysis of 8 sections of legislative text.
Requires 12 months of full‑benefit postpartum Medicaid/CHIP coverage, state cost studies of maternity care, obstetric unit closure notice/reporting, expanded Medicare hospital reporting, and Commissioned Corps deployment authority for maternal needs.
Requires states to study and report the costs of providing maternity, labor, and delivery services and tightens federal rules to protect access to maternity care. It makes 12-month, full-benefit postpartum Medicaid/CHIP coverage mandatory nationwide, requires advance public notice and community-impact reporting before hospital obstetric unit closures, expands Medicare cost-reporting for labor-and-delivery data, and authorizes Commissioned Corps deployment to respond to urgent maternal health care needs caused by closures or workforce losses.