Virginia Health Care Foundation gets $1 million grant to help children

The Virginia Health Care Foundation has received a federal grant of nearly $1 million to help identify children from low-income families who qualify for government assistance.

The funding was part of $32 million in grants awarded to agencies and organizations in 22 states by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

“Today’s grants will ensure that more children across the nation have access to the quality health care they need,” HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a statement released Tuesday.

With the money, organizations such as the Virginia Health Care Foundation will step up efforts to find children who qualify for Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program.

The outreach comes as Virginia prepares to begin enrollment this fall in an online marketplace for subsidized insurance, one of the provisions of the new federal health care law.

Debbie Oswalt, executive director of the Virginia Health Care Organization, said the $999,993 awarded to her group will be used for six additional case workers who will be sent to the state’s most needy areas.

One of those regions is the Martinsville-Henry County area.

The Virginia foundation, which has an annual budget of about $7 million, will use the nearly $1 million grant over a two-year period.

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