Roundup of the 2024 Illinois Legislative Session
Every year, Howard Brown Health (HBH) supports several state legislative priorities to advance healthcare for LGBTQ+ patients. There were some important LGBTQ+ health equity and healthcare funding bills that Howard Brown and our community advocated for and passed during the 2024 Illinois General Assembly Legislative Session!
State Budget
The FY 2025 State budget and recently passed Medicaid omnibus bill includes a few vital funding provisions that will help health centers in Illinois. Legislators included an increase of funding for the HBIA/HBIS or Healthy Illinois for All programs for ages 42 and older in the state’s FY25 budget. This will provide $440 million from the General Revenue Funds and $189 million from other sources for a total of $629 million. This will help further close coverage gasps as it provides Medicaid-like coverage for low-income residents regardless of immigration status. This funding is necessary with the influx of immigration into Chicago from Central and Latin America. This additional funding will positively impact Howard Brown’s patients to gain better access to healthcare coverage. On average 30% of Howard Brown patients utilize Medicaid, and 21% are uninsured or qualify for a sliding scale.
An additional $40 million above the initial proposed appropriation was given to implement the HOME Illinois plan to prevent and end homelessness. This funding will primarily be focused on rental assistance, homeless prevention, and funding to address youth homelessness. 28% of LGBTQ youth report experiencing homelessness or housing instability at some point in their lives. Howard Brown’s Broadway Youth Center provides support for LGBTQ+ youth experiencing homelessness or unstable housing and this funding will go a long way in helping LGBTQ+ youth find the safe and stable housing they deserve.
There are some important additions to the 2025 Medicaid omnibus bill around psychiatric care and medication access. SB3668 will lift unnecessary prior authorization (PA) requirements for certain psychiatric medications so patients can get vital medications as soon as they need them. This budget will also increase Medicaid psychiatry reimbursement rates (SB3668) and increase rates for psychiatric evaluations and substance use disorder treatment, as well as medication monitoring performed by community mental health centers (HB4664). The cost of psychiatric care can be high for patients and Medicaid reimbursement rates in Illinois are historically low compared to neighboring states. Increasing these reimbursement rates will make psychiatric care more affordable for low-income residents. This will allow places like Howard Brown where a large population of our patients use Medicaid for their healthcare coverage to affordably treat more patients.
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
In this session, we were able to see the passage of the Nonprofit Board Diversity Reporting Bill (SB2930). Illinois will now require non-profits that provide $1,000,000 or more in grants each year to release aggregated demographic information of its board of directors and officers. This includes race, ethnicity, gender, disability status, veteran status, sexual orientation, and gender identity. This is to ensure non-profit boards and leadership are reflective of the populations they serve. We want to applaud our partners at Equality Illinois for their leadership in the passage of this bill!
The other bill, the Support Trans Candidates Running for Chicago’s Elected School Board Act (HB4924) would update the Illinois School Code to ensure trans individuals who are candidates for Chicago’s elected school board don’t have to publish their deadnames on their nominating petitions. This requirement is harmful to trans and gender-diverse individuals who would be forced to release a deadname or inadvertently out themselves as these names would become public record. While these bills did not pass this session, we will continue to advocate for these important bills.
340B
Even with the wins this legislative session, there is still further advocacy work to be done. One major bill that unfortunately didn’t pass this session was the Illinois Patient Access to 340B Pharmacy Protection Act (SB3727). This bill would prohibit pharmaceutical manufacturers from prohibiting, restricting, or interfering with a local pharmacy that contracts with a 340B covered entity, including community health centers like Howard Brown, to dispense medications acquired through the 340B program. This legislation will help to ensure that the medications needed by patients are available at their local pharmacies and safeguard critical 340B savings that we invest in expanding services and programs our patients rely on. We can still do lots of advocacy to ensure the 340B program is protected. Congress recently introduced the 340B ACCESS Act (HR 8574) aimed to ensure 340B’s long-term viability as a critical resource for Community Health Centers and their patients. You can show your support for the 340B Access Act by contacting your Representatives and telling them we need Congress to take action and reform the 340B Program to ensure we can continue to serve our nation’s most vulnerable patients.
Insurance Coverage and Prior Authorization
We strongly advocated for The Prior Authorization Reform Act (HB5051) which would prohibit health insurance providers from requiring prior authorization for a prescription drug prescribed to a patient by a healthcare professional for 6 or more consecutive months. Many of our patients have experienced denials of coverage for necessary and life-saving medications due to burdensome and unnecessary prior authorization requirements from insurers. This bill would also prohibit prior authorization requirements for certain specific FDA-approved prescription drugs, including insulin, human immunodeficiency virus prevention medication such as PrEP and PEP; human immunodeficiency virus treatment medication; viral hepatitis medication; and hormonal therapy drugs used for gender-affirming care. We are continuing to push for this legislation as it will provide immediate and life-saving medications for our patients.
The Illinois legislature passed a SB3203 that would cap patient costs for prescription inhalers at $25 a month. The bill’s passage follows years of outcry from patients with asthma and other lung conditions over the cost of inhalers. The annual per person medical cost for asthma prescriptions was $1,830. The passage of this bill will relieve the high financial burden of rising inhaler costs.
The passage of the Healthcare Protection Act (HB5395) will ban PAs for admission for inpatient psychiatric services for the first 72 hours on an inpatient stay. These will help make access to psychiatric medications and inpatient care more available. When needed it also bans step therapy, an insurance practice that requires a patient to try a lower-cost drug or therapy first. This will ensure that patients have access to the medications that best suits their needs.
Education and Training
There were a couple of bills focused on education introduced in this session that HBH strongly supported. The Supporting Implementation of the Keeping Youth Safe and Healthy Act (SB3384) requested an appropriation of $20 million in the FY25 State Budget as a grantmaking program to support those public school districts that want to teach comprehensive sex education that is vital to the health and safety of Illinois students. This would have helped eliminate barriers to teaching comprehensive sex education by funding much needed training and curriculum development.
We also sought to pass the LGBTQ+ and HIV Cultural Competency for Legal Professionals (HR582) that urged the Illinois Supreme Court to adopt a continuing education mandate for LGBTQ+ and HIV cultural competency education for attorneys, judges, and courtroom staff. LGBTQ+ and people living with HIV (PLWH are disproportionately incarcerated and have negative experiences when trying to access legal services due to their identities and HIV status. While the cultural competency for legal professionals resolution was adopted by the house, it failed to advance. We are committed to fully pushing this bill through in the upcoming legislative sessions.
HIV Treatment and Prevention
There are a couple of HIV-related budget appropriations HBH advocated for that would ease the burden of individuals getting tested for HIV and connected to healthcare quickly. However, for the first time in the last four fiscal years, state legislators did not include any new HIV-related funding in the state’s Fiscal Year 2025 budget. There are several HIV-related budget items that will operate with level funding for the FY 2025 budget.
- Getting to Zero (GTZ) Illinois Omnibus budget which is a state-wide initiative to end the HIV epidemic in the state by 2030 ($5.5 million).
- HIV treatment and prevention services, also known as the HIV Lump Sum ($25.5 million).
- The African American HIV/AIDS Response Act (AAHARA) funds grants to Black-led community-based organizations and HIV services meant to address the disproportionate impact of HIV/AIDS on African Americans and other communities of color ($15 million).
- Grants and administrative expenses for the distribution of PrEP medication access ($2 million).
- The Quality-of-Life Endowment Fund for grants related to HIV/AIDS prevention and education ($1 million).
- Administrative expenses associated with STI testing, treatment, and prevention. ($500,000).
We would like to thank our partners at AIDS Foundation of Chicago for all their hard work and leadership on securing this important funding.
The Strengthening & Protecting Illinois HIV Funding Infrastructure (SPIHFI): (HB5667) bill would have provided an $2 million increase in state funding for HIV education, prevention, testing, and treatment. This would include $2.5 million in new funding to launch eight Rapid Start for HIV Treatment pilot sites that establish HIV treatment standards that would connect people with treatment within 7 days of initial diagnosis or 7 days of referral to HIV medical care. While this bill didn’t pass, we will fight to increase access to HIV testing and treatment in Illinois. We would like to thank our partners at AIDS Foundation of Chicago for all their hard work and leadership on this bill.
the Connection to HIV Testing and Linkage to Care (LTC) Act (HB5417) would enact reforms to ease HIV-testing and connection to treatment by mandating at-home HIV and/or sexually transmitted infections (STIs) testing kits be covered by insurers and Medicaid without cost-sharing; create 8 rapid start pilot sites that would connect people with treatment within 7 days of initial diagnosis or within 7 days of referral to HIV medical care; and ensures that all county jails provide HIV/AIDS education to people who are incarcerated and visitors, as well as link them to HIV testing as mandated by Illinois’ County Jail Act. It is vital that people newly diagnosed with HIV gain access to treatment and other wrap-around services as soon as possible. HB5417 passed the Illinois House with a bipartisan, unanimous vote, but the bill was unable to advance through both chambers. We will continue to fight for people to gain immediate access to the healthcare they need. We would like to thank our partners at AIDS Foundation of Chicago for all their hard work and leadership on this bill.
To learn more about how Howard Brown Health contributes to vital advocacy work and has an impact on local, state, and federal policymaking, please visit our Advocacy webpage.