Providing Healthy Futures for Former Foster Youth

Posted by Juvenile Law Center on May 11, 2015

Effective since January, 2014, a provision of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) made former foster youth eligible for Medicaid coverage until age 26, regardless of their income, as long as they were in foster care at age 18 or older and enrolled in Medicaid at that time.

This provision gives former foster youth the same kind of support that other young adults have under the ACA: the ability to have free health insurance until age 26.

http://jlc.org/coveredtil26pa

Despite the availability of health insurance under ACA for over a year, many eligible young adults across the country have not enrolled – primarily because they don’t know that they qualify. Juvenile Law Center has developed new materials, including application information for every state, that anyone can use to help reach out and inform current and former foster youth about this important Medicaid benefit.

http://jlc.org/blog/providing-healthy-futures-former-foster-youth