Cheaper health insurance changed their lives. Then it went away.

Congress allowed enhanced ACA subsidies, first introduced in 2021 and extended through 2025, to expire at year's end, and Mississippi enrollment has since fallen by nearly two-thirds in eight months. Nationally about 3 million people have dropped off ACA plans, down to roughly 19.2 million from a record 21.8 million in 2025.

Mississippi, the nation's poorest state and the only one where every county sits in the CDC's diabetes belt, had tripled its ACA enrollment from under 99,000 in 2020 to more than 338,000 by the end of 2025 through a state public information campaign. State health officer Dr. Daniel Edney credited the coverage with improving the state's health rankings from last to 48th; diabetic residents like Derrick Clark now face losing the routine care that prevents blindness and amputation.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.