Government Shutdown Halts Most Home Medicare Telehealth Coverage

The expanded telehealth coverage under Medicare began in March 2020 to keep older adults from being exposed to COVID-19 in hospital and doctors’ waiting rooms. The service has been a boon for those who have difficulty getting to medical appointments, including older adults living in rural areas or with mobility problems. 

A spending package that the president signed Nov. 12, 2025, extended Medicare’s coverage of home telehealth services for 80 days until Jan. 30. It also allowed the government to reimburse providers who saw Medicare patients during the shutdown after the enhanced telehealth services provisions had expired.

If passed, the new legislation will extend Medicare's expanded telehealth coverage almost two years. The new end date would be Dec. 31, 2027.

Hundreds of groups call for permanent telehealth benefits

More than 450 organizations, including AARP, urged Congress to make the changes permanent and joined a letter from the Alliance for Connected Care that called for Congress to provide a long-term telehealth fix for Medicare “to ensure stability and provide clarity for patients, providers and the health care system as a whole.”

The current “cycle of temporary fixes has resulted in patients and providers facing continued disruptions in care,” said the alliance, a coalition of health care and technology interests. Caregivers strapped for time to transport their loved ones have benefited from the convenience.

“It’s probably the only good thing that came out of COVID, frankly, in terms of improving access, because it’s been such a resounding success,” Nicholas Widmyer, director of federal affairs for the National Association of Community Health Centers based in Bethesda, Maryland, said last year. An end to these services “would be a step backwards for a lot of our patients’ ability to access primary care.”

“We are in a race against time,” says Kyle Zebley, ATA chief executive officer. Failure to extend the current telehealth provisions “potentially leave[s] millions without the ability to access a health care provider remotely and set[s] back the clock on technological progress in care delivery.”

Organizations including the alliance and the ATA, with nearly 500 industry members total, are pushing to continue the expanded telehealth options. AARP is a supporter of the public education campaign Telehealth Access for America, for all ages, along with the American Medical Association, American Hospital Association and nearly 50 other groups. 

Several bipartisan bills were introduced in 2025 that would continue the COVID-19 Medicare telehealth provisions or make them permanent. They include:

• A lasting solution. The Creating Opportunities Now for Necessary and Effective Care Technologies (CONNECT) for Health Act of 2025, H.R. 4206 and S. 1261, would erase the end date for the expanded telehealth provisions. Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i) reintroduced S. 1261 in April 2025, while Reps. Mike Thompson (D-Calif.) and David Schweikert (R-Ariz.) filed H.R. 4206 in June 2025. AARP has endorsed these companion bills.
  
  
• An extension. The Telehealth Modernization Act, H.R. 5081, was introduced in September 2025 by Reps. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) and Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.). Sens. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) and Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i) also filed the Senate version, S. 2709, the same month. These bills would extend the Medicare telehealth flexibilities through Sept 30, 2027.

All have been referred to committees without any action taken. The bill that the House will take up next week adds three more months to H.R. 5081/S. 2709.

Pandemic changed perceptions of telemedicine

In the early part of the pandemic, nearly half of Medicare beneficiaries had at least one virtual medical visit between April and June 2020. And participation continued to be much higher than pre-pandemic levels, according to data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).

The original waiver was temporary, ending after the public health emergency was declared over on May 11, 2023. Congress subsequently folded extensions into various spending bills.

“Telehealth is important because it breaks down geographic barriers to care,” Zebley says. “It’s important to virtually every American.”

Brown University research found that about 15 percent of all original Medicare beneficiaries had telehealth appointments in the first half of 2025, primarily to help monitor and treat chronic conditions.

Nearly three-quarters of adults 50 and older said they used telehealth services at least once in the past 12 months, according to a January 2024 AARP poll. Nine in 10 said they were somewhat or very satisfied with their experience; about half of those surveyed were on Medicare, the federal insurance program that helps pay health care costs for adults age 65 and older and some younger than 65 with disabling conditions.

Telehealth is most popular among people 65 and older with long-term disabilities, as well as those who qualify for both Medicare and Medicaid, according to KFF, a nonpartisan nonprofit with offices in Washington that studies health care trends.

Medical appointments at home help those with disabilities

Some patients who had telehealth appointments scheduled during the 43-day shutdown in 2025 had to travel to an office or medical facility because of the uncertainty of home telemedicine coverage.

In the first quarter of 2020, before the pandemic, fewer than 7 percent of Medicare patients used telehealth services, according to CMS data. That shot up to nearly 47 percent the next quarter.

By the end of 2023, the percentage had dropped substantially, to about 13 percent of people using original Medicare, but that’s still twice the rate of those using telehealth before the pandemic, says Alex Cottrill, senior policy analyst for KFF’s Medicare policy program.

“Telehealth can be a lifeline for people with disabilities, especially for disabilities that impact their mobility,” Cottrill says. People whose incomes are low also may have a tougher time physically getting to a doctor’s office or may not be able to miss work for an in-person visit.

Benefits include better management of chronic conditions

How much telehealth costs Medicare is difficult to assess, he says. The practice often uses fewer resources and takes up less clinician time. The extra convenience may mean that more people will use medical services, but in the long run, that may also mean lower costs if regular care prevents more serious illnesses later.

Medicare has been paying providers the same rates for telemedicine and in-person appointments. 

Zebley says he’s optimistic Medicare telehealth coverage will continue, even if it is in a series of extensions retroactively.

“It’s just that Congress, the federal government, has difficulty doing basic things. It’s a fraught moment in time,” he says. “They’ll make us sweat it. It might be last minute, but I think we’re going to get it done.”