ORLANDO, Fla. — Florida is one of 10 states that haven’t expanded the Medicaid public health insurance program under the Affordable Care Act.

Health care advocates say that’s left hundreds of thousands of Floridians without health insurance. Several health care advocate groups are now pushing to get expanded Medicaid services in Florida.

In Florida, residents that make more than $19,000 a year are unlikely to qualify for Medicaid.

The American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network and other groups are urging Florida leaders to expand Medicaid benefits so more people will be eligible for benefits, and fewer will go uninsured. 

Florida Decides Healthcare is working to get enough signatures for a ballot amendment for 2026. If that effort is successful, the state would have to provide health care coverage for adults under 65 who are at or below 138% of the federal poverty level.

Eimear Roy said she came from Ireland to America 30 years ago with an American dream.

“I came over here with this dream if I work hard, you know, working class, and now it just feels overwhelming,” said Roy.

Roy says her husband lost his job in January, and because he’s getting unemployment benefits, she and one of their children, who both have disabilities, were told by the state they have too much income to qualify for Medicaid benefits.

“You have to be certain death, near death or total death in order to qualify,” she said. “Sorry, I just try to make light of the situation because it’s so overwhelming.”

Roy says she now suffers from long COVID, and without access to heart and diabetes medication, her health has suffered. She’s stretching out what she has left of her inhaler.

She says she’d like to go back to work, but can’t.

“I just want to breathe, I just want to keep my heart beating, and contribute,” said Roy.

“Everybody’s ticking along doing their best and I think it just makes sense to expand it properly,” she added.

Roy’s husband got a new job, but she said the new insurance premiums aren’t affordable.

And she says medical debt has put her family in a balancing act of paying bills.

“There’s hundreds of thousands of people like me, denied Social Security, taxes on the house, behind on the mortgage, health insurance marketplace, apparently one of my kids is about to lose coverage,” said Roy.

It’s a dilemma Roy said could be avoided if she could just qualify for Medicaid benefits.