POLITICO States often reduce Medicaid benefits during economic downturns. Doing that now could prolong the pandemic. A nurse puts on protective glasses as she gets ready to go into one of the triage rooms to care for a Covid-19 positive patient in the emergency department at Sutter Roseville Medical Center in Roseville, Calif., on Dec. 22, 2020. | Renee C. Byer/The Sacramento Bee via AP, Pool) By NISARG PATEL, DANIEL LIEBMAN and SMITHA GANESHAN 02/08/2021 04:30 AM EST Link Copied Daniel Liebman is a resident physician at Harvard Medical School. Smitha Ganeshan is a resident physician at the University of California, San Francisco. Of all the tools the government has to combat Covid-19, Medicaid is arguably one of the most important. Medicaid provides health insurance for millions of Americans in low-paid service jobs, the essential workers who are among those most vulnerable to contracting and spreading the virus. Medicaid also pays the bills for millions of nursing home residents, whose lives are most at risk, and provides a critical link to primary care physicians for millions more families who will need to be vaccinated in coming months.