Medicare Agreement
Puts Traditional Medicare At Serious Risk: N4a
Washington, D.C., Nov. 21, 2003
The National Association of Area Agencies on Aging (n4a)
believes that numerous provisions in the Medicare Prescription Drug
conference report released this week put traditional Medicare at
serious risk, stated Chief Executive Officer Sandy Markwood. The
program as it is currently structured has worked well for over 35 years
for millions of seniors and people with disabilities, but current and
future beneficiaries now face the very real threat of losing existing
guaranteed benefits in exchange for a limited prescription drug
benefit, she added.
Enacting a universal Medicare
prescription drug benefit is one of n4as top legislative priorities
this year. As an organization whose primary goal is providing a better
quality of life for all seniors, n4a has worked hard with members of
Congress to develop legislation that would provide a meaningful
prescription drug benefit, but the agreement, as outlined in the
conference report, falls far short of the mark, Markwood said.
There is a very real threat that opening
the Medicare program to the private insurance market will make
traditional fee-for-service unaffordable for millions of Medicare
beneficiaries, especially those with low incomes, according to n4a
President Bob McFalls. A six-year demonstration program starting in 2010
included in the tentative agreement would subject traditional
fee-for-service providers to competitive bidding by private insurers.
Experts estimated that if the Medicare program were opened to the
private market premium variances between states and even within a single
state could be up to almost $100 dollars a month.
n4a leaders expressed apprehension over
other provisions included in the conference agreement. We are concerned
that the bill does little to promote greater access to generic drugs,
restricts price control negotiations, and includes very weak
re-importation provisions. Increasingly higher amounts of seniors
income is going to pay for needed prescription drugs and its
frustrating that these viable means of holding down the burgeoning cost
of pharmaceuticals are not addressed directly in the agreement, said
McFalls and Markwood.
The drug benefit itself is not as
generous as many seniors might imagine and, with the sizeable gap in
coverage there are quite a few that wont receive any relief from the
benefit. Many could end up losing their more generous retiree coverage
as well as paying higher premiums. Seniors have been waiting a long
time for a prescription drug benefit, but n4a believes that the
structural changes to the current program which threaten the
universality and guaranteed benefit of the Medicare program are too
great a concession for the modest prescription drug benefit offered. We
cant, in good conscience, support passage of this legislation, McFalls
and Markwood concluded.
The
National Association of Area Agencies on Aging (n4a) is the
umbrella organization for the 655 area agencies on aging (AAAs) and the
representative body for the interests of 230 Title VI Native American
aging programs in Washington, D.C.. Through its presence in the nations
capital, n4a advocates on behalf of the local aging agencies to ensure
that needed resources and supportive services are available to older
Americans. |
