Over 34,000 L.A. County households lost Medi-Cal in July amid rollback of COVID rules

Valerie Ibarra-Figueroa, right, a health insurance specialist at the Venice Family Clinic, talks on the phone to a county employee on behalf of Jessica Sanchez, 33, while helping get her Medi-Cal coverage reinstated. More than 34,000 households in Los Angeles County have had their Medi-Cal coverage discontinued this month as California joins other states in beginning to cut off people from Medicaid programs who no longer meet income requirements or whose paperwork was not submitted in time, according to figures provided by the county. Health officials and legal advocates are closely eyeing such early figures to see how a major shift in health coverage is playing out in L.A. County and across California, amid concerns that people who legally qualify for Medicaid could end up losing it unnecessarily or suffering interruptions in their coverage. In Los Angeles County, the vast majority of those who lost Medi-Cal — more than 30,000 cases — had their coverage discontinued after renewal paperwork was not marked as received by the county, according to figures presented Wednesday by the county Department of Public Social Services. “Sometimes people are turning things in, it’s not marked as received, and they see their Medi-Cal terminate anyways,” David Kane, an attorney at the Western Center on Law & Poverty, said during a county meeting.