Next year, Louisiana will begin to provide Medicaid services to prisoners 60 days before their release date. The program will debut at Elayn Hunt and expand to other prisons, marking a significant step towards more seamless reentry programming in Louisiana, a state juggling rising corrections costs and an aging prison population.
Healthcare costs are rising for the Louisiana Department of Corrections (DOC). A House Fiscal Division’s budget review of the DOC revealed that spending on healthcare (the total including on-site care, off-site care, and pharmaceuticals) rose nearly $30 million between 2022 and 2024.
This jump from $100.1 million in 2022 to $129.8 million in 2024 has come alongside an increase in the number of inmates over the age of 50. According to the DOC demographic dashboard, the state held 6,883 inmates over the age of 50 at the end of 2022, and 8,149 inmates over the age of 50 in August of 2026. While hardly the sole contributor to the increased spending on healthcare, older inmates often incur more medical expenses than their younger counterparts. Over recent years, the rollback of good time credit and extension of sentences in Louisiana means that more people are spending longer amounts of time in prison, meaning that the amount of elderly inmates in Louisiana prisons has likely not reached its peak. With more older people in custody and longer stays in general, the state’s spending on prison healthcare is unlikely to shrink on its own, making any source of relief worth careful consideration.
Healthcare costs are not going away in Louisiana prisons, or outside of them. People returning from incarceration have higher rates of illness when compared to the general population. The negative impacts of these health issues can easily compound upon release from prison, when access to healthcare is often less standardized and more difficult to come by. To independently apply, understand, and exercise the benefits of Medicaid can seem an insurmountable barrier to someone who is simultaneously looking for work, housing, and community.
The high (and potentially increasing) cost of inmate health care in Louisiana, driven in part by an aging population, alongside the health risks of the reentry period presented a challenge: how can Louisiana spend less on prisoner healthcare while also giving the people the care they need before and after release?
Reentry Medicaid coverage offers a strategic solution. Connecting inmates with care 60 days before their release date can offer a small fiscal pressure valve, lifting some of the financial burden of healthcare from their respective prisons for approximately two months. This strategy has long term implications. Every person who does not reoffend and instead successfully reenters is one less person in prison, potentially growing old at the state’s expense. Pre-release connection to healthcare helps to aid in the transition back into society by reducing the amount of administrative hurdles to be overcome upon release. The Medicaid coverage offered to inmates includes resources for mental health and substance abuse treatment, a frequent contributor to recidivism, and in doing so, adds another safeguard against future repeat offenders.