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Medicare News
Medicare Spends Billions Annually on Products
Available at Lower Prices
New York Times finds better prices from retail, online stores
 Nov 30, 2007 - "Despite enormous buying power,
Medicare pays far more" than individuals for equipment and services that
are "available at far lower prices from retail pharmacies and online
stores," the
New York Times reports.
As a result of "fierce patient and corporate
lobbying," Medicare in many cases pays prices for products and services
based on rates established in the 1980s, "when devices were often much
more expensive than they are now," according to the Times.
The "widespread price discrepancies ... have been
noted in dozens of regulatory reports," but, when lawmakers "have tried
to cut these costs, they have often encountered a powerful foe: the
companies that sell these devices, who ask their elderly customers to
serve, in effect, as unpaid lobbyists, calling and writing to their
representatives in Congress, protesting at rallies, and even
participating in political attacks against individual lawmakers who take
on the issue," the Times reports.
Former Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.) said, "These
industries rely on a basic threat: If you mess with us, we can turn the
seniors against you," adding, "Angering seniors is the quickest route to
political suicide."
Oxygen Equipment
The Times highlighted the prices that Medicare pays
for oxygen equipment. Individuals who purchase oxygen equipment from
pharmacies and other retailers pay about $3,500 for a three-year supply.
Medicare, rather than purchase oxygen equipment,
pays as much as $8,280 to rent the equipment for 36 months and cover the
cost of a "variety of services that critics say are often unnecessary,"
the Times reports.
According to the Times, some lawmakers maintain
that the "only way to lower Medicare's payments is to bypass the
political process altogether, to insulate individual politicians from
blame."
Deputy
CMS Administrator Herb Kuhn said that the agency has faced political
and logistical problems in efforts to reduce the prices Medicare pays
for equipment and services, adding that the agency has begun to
implement a competitive bidding system to address the issue. Kuhn said,
"There's no question that parts of Medicare are mispriced" (Duhigg, New
York Times, 11/30).
>>
Read complete report at New York Times
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Copyright: SeniorJournal.com |
Nov.
26, 2007