HHS Announces an Additional $15B in Relief Fund Distributions

Published in Government Relations on June 09, 2020

HHS has announced an additional $15B in relief fund distributions from the Provider Relief Fund, which will be made available to eligible providers that participate in state Medicaid and CHIP programs. Providers who have previously received a payment from the Provider Relief Fund General Allocation will not be eligible for this next round of funding. To be eligible for this funding, health care providers 1) must not have received payments from either Round 1 or Round 2 of the $50 billion Provider Relief Fund General Distribution and 2) must have directly billed their state Medicaid/CHIP programs or Medicaid managed care plans for healthcare-related services between January 1, 2018, to May 31, 2020.

Eligible Medicaid and CHIP providers will be asked to report their annual patient revenue, which will be used to determine their Provider Relief Fund payment. Similar to Rounds 1 and 2 of the General Distribution, the payment to each provider in this round of funding will be at least 2 percent of reported gross revenue from patient care; the final amount each provider receives will be determined after the data is submitted, which will include information about the number of Medicaid patients each providers served.

According to the announcement from HHS, this funding will supply relief to Medicaid and CHIP providers experiencing lost revenues or increased expenses due to COVID-19. Examples of providers, serving Medicaid/CHIP beneficiaries, possibly eligible for this funding include pediatricians, obstetrician-gynecologists, dentists, opioid treatment and behavioral health providers, assisted living facilities and other home and community-based services providers.

Providers can visit https://www.hhs.gov/coronavirus/cares-act-provider-relief-fund/general-information/index.html for more information on this latest round of relief funding. An additional $10B will be sent to safety net hospitals this week (week of June 9).

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