Medicare Official Visits to Explain New Prescription Drug Program
Posted on: Saturday, 20 August 2005, 09:00 CDT
Medicare's top official visited the Buffalo area Wednesday on a 75-city bus tour to promote the federal program's new prescription drug plan.
Starting Jan. 1, Medicare will offer coverage for prescription drugs through private insurance companies.
Dr. Mark McClellan, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, described the new benefit as the most significant change in the 40-year history of Medicare, the government health program for the elderly and the disabled.
"It doesn't make sense to cover the complications of disease and not help prevent the complications," McClellan told an audience of about 70 in the Amherst Center for Senior Services.
He and Michael O. Leavitt, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, have been traveling the country as part of a "national conversation" to educate consumers, caregivers and others about the program, whose enrollment begins Nov. 15.
Enrollment is not mandatory, but McClellan urged the 41 million people nationwide who are eligible to consider carefully the benefits that will be offered. Because different private health care plans have different offerings of medications, enrollees will have to compare in determining which best suits their medical needs.
Like other types of insurance, the Medicare prescription coverage, called Part D, will charge a monthly premium and an annual deductible that must be paid before the benefit kicks in. There also will be a co-payment for brand-name and generic medications.
Nationally, the average monthly premium is expected to be $32.20, about $5 less than had been anticipated. In addition, beneficiaries will have to pay an annual deductible of $250. After that, Medicare will pay 75 percent of prescription costs up to $2,000.
Consumers must pay 100 percent of drug costs from $2,251 to $5,100. After a Medicare recipient has paid a total of $3,600 out- of-pocket in a year, the plan will pay 95 percent of subsequent costs.
About 14 million low-income beneficiaries will be eligible for subsidies that could eliminate costs for premiums.
The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the prescription program will cost the country $593 billion through 2013, an increase of $41 billion over the original estimate.
But Medicare recently announced that the new benefit would cost about 14 percent less than estimated next year, resulting in lower premiums.
McClellan advised against delaying enrollment in a prescription plan because insurers will charge increasingly higher premiums each month after the initial six-month enrollment period.
For information on the new benefits, go online to www.medicare.gov or call (800) MEDICARE. Information also is being mailed to those who qualify.
e-mail: hdavis@buffnews.com
Source: Buffalo News
Related Articles
- Video: Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit Annual Enrollment Period is Halfway Over
- Bid for Rx Web Site Now Online Using Auctions to Reduce Prescription Drug Costs
- Medicare Fact Sheet: May 15th Medicare Prescription Drug Enrollment Deadline Information
- Senator Bob Dole Promotes Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit in Houston As Millions Continue to Enroll
- Top Official: State Will Get Medicare Costs Back; The Health and Human Services Chief Pledges to Require Insurers to Pay for Drug-Benefit Coverage.
- Ohio Temporarily Covering Medicare Prescription-Drug Co-Pays for Poor
- Medicare Prescription Drug Program's Enrollment Numbers Meet Varying Responses
- Hastert, McClellan to Kick-Off Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit
- Medicare Rx Access Network of Minnesota Encourages All Medicare Beneficiaries to Prepare to Enroll in the New Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit
- Florida Medicare Prescription Drug Plans
 |
 |
User Comments (0)
RSS Feeds