July 23, 2003
Medicare reform made simple
Isn’t this Medicare reform stuff confusing? Prescription benefits that start then stop then start again make it extremely difficult to figure out exactly what the Republicans are up to here, but James Ridgeway does a great job boiling things down:
This legislation, passed in different versions in both House and Senate, must now be reconciled in a conference committee. It aims to provide relief to seniors who currently bear the full cost of the prescription drugs they purchase.
But critics suspect it is meant to make matters worse, confusing and distorting the existing Medicare program until the right wing can abolish it altogether. Passed in 1965, Medicare is one of the very few liberal entitlement programs left.
The legislation is "a farce," said Dr. Quentin Young of Physicians for a National Health Program. "The estimates are that costs for seniors over the next 10 years will total 1.8 trillion. The most generous estimate of the 'benefit' is 400 billion. So it doesn't cover even 25 percent of the total cost."
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If this legislation ever passes, seniors will be so confused about what's going on that they may never know just how much the government is screwing them. Neither the Bush administration nor Congress has much interest in regulating the exorbitant price of drugs. In fact, they are waging a straightforward attack on what little we have of a universal health-care system.
For now, the House and Senate are split. The Senate's plan covers 50 percent of drug costs up to $4500 a year. Inexplicably, when they reach $4,500, the benefits stop, but pick up again when they reach $5,800. At that point Medicare would cover 90 percent of the costs.
In the House version, 80 percent of drug costs would be covered up to $2,000 a year. Then nothing up to $4,900. For all costs over $4,900, Medicare pays 100 percent.
If it passes, the legislation won't take effect until 2006, when the federal budget deficit will be going through the roof. According to an analysis by Consumer Reports, the House version will actually cause seniors to pay more in out-of-pocket annual drug costs ($2,954) than they do now ($2,318).
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As for the poor elderly, they really get screwed. Six million of them wouldn’t get a red cent. Instead, they'll be thrown to the wolves by way of the state Medicaid programs, which vary from place to place and will be severely strapped by the fiscal crisis now facing the states.
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