Nebraska Rushed Medicaid Work Rules. Then a Cancer Patient Was Told He’d Lost Coverage.

Eli McCreary of Omaha, Nebraska, said he had recently been diagnosed with kidney cancer when he got a call from a local hospital run by CHI Health. He said he was informed that he wasn’t insured anymore under Medicaid — and that the hospital would cancel his appointments unless he paid out-of-pocket. McCreary, who was 64 at the time, said he phoned a call center for help. He said he was told his benefits under Medicaid, the government health program for people with low incomes or disabilities, now required that he have a job. “You’re required to do work to stay on,” McCreary said a representative told him. “And you haven’t fulfilled your work requirement.” For decades, McCreary said, he has battled drug addiction. A substance use treatment program discharged him in March, and in June he was diagnosed with cancer in his right kidney, according to documents reviewed by KFF Health News. He also has diabetes and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. “I don’t understand what job I can get,” McCreary said. “I can’t walk. I can hardly breathe. I can’t move around. What job am I going to get?” McCreary said he canceled a CT scan and other tests at the hospital, which is part of CommonSpir...