Fault Lines - The Coverage Gap - full episode

November 10, 2015 6:15PM ET

Fault Lines examines why millions of mostly working poor Americans have been left without any health care coverage

Topics:
U.S.
Health Care
Medicare & Medicaid
 

After rancorous debate, a Supreme Court case, and enrollment glitches, President Obama's signature legislation, the Affordable Care Act, has finally gone into effect. 

But the president's plan of offering affordable health care to most Americans has an unintended gap in it. While the Supreme Court upheld the law as constitutional, it allowed states to decide whether to expand their Medicaid programs to more of their poorest residents. Now more than 5 million Americans—mostly indigent and working poor—have been left without access to health care coverage because nearly half the states have opted out of Medicaid expansion.

Fault Lines travels to Florida, Texas and North Carolina to examine the U.S.'s new health care dichotomy—how some of the country's poorest communities are being left behind while elsewhere millions of others in the same demographic have access to life-saving care.

Original air date: July 12, 2014


Credits:

Executive Producer: Mathieu Skene, Senior Producers: Carrie Lozano @carrielozano, Reem Akkad @reemakkad, Correspondent: Josh Rushing @joshrushing, Directors of Photography: Victor Suarez @tadashi_lives and Singeli Agnew @singeli, Producer: Lauren Rosenfeld @lollymr, Additional Camera: Joel Van Haren @joelvanharen, Martin Asturias @martinasturias, Editors: Keith Wilson @keithtwitted, Jennifer Beman @jbwpost and Warwick Meade @warwickmeade, Digital Producer: Nikhil Swaminathan @sw4mi, Associate Digital Producer: Danielle Powell @DanielleJenene Production Manager: Dana Merwin, Production Assistance: Abdulai Bah @africandobah, Gavin McIntyre @gavin_mci, Shannon Najmabadi @SNajmabadi, Andra Cernavskis @AndraCernavskis, Mark Kurlyandchik @mkurlyandchik, Sara Lafleur-Vetter @lafleurius, Lynne Shallcross @lshallcross

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