Implications for Children’s Dental Medicaid Policy in the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005

The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (DRA) made sweeping changes within the Medicaid program, many of which were previously only possible through a federally approved waiver. Many of the original tenets of the Medicaid program were discarded in DRA by providing the opportunity to eliminate such standards as “statewideness” and “comparability.” Building on previous DRA briefs issued by the Children’s Dental Health Project this brief, excerpted from a technical analysis of the law, details the implications of these reforms for children’s dental health policy.