Coming February 6, 2024 . . .
MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
Pre-order at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop
Coming February 6, 2024 . . . MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE by Michael Wolraich Pre-order at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop |
By Mary Agnes Carey, Kaiser Health News in collaboration with USA Today, March 3, 2014
[....] CMS’ plan to alter Part D has hit heavy opposition. In a letter to CMS, more than 200 groups representing patients, seniors, health insurers, drug makers and business urged the agency to withdraw the proposed rule. The groups say it would “dramatically expand the federal government’s role in Medicare Part D despite the fact that there is no compelling reason for doing so.” If it becomes law, “millions of seniors and beneficiaries with disabilities would lose their current plan of choice or face changes in coverage,” they wrote.
Opposition is growing on Capitol Hill as well. A bipartisan majority of the Senate Finance Committee wrote to CMS Administrator Marilyn Tavenner on Friday to object to the proposed rule. Given Part D's "remarkable success, we are perplexed as to why [CMS] would propose to fundamentally restructure Part D by requiring immediate, large-scale changes to the program that have direct consequences for beneficiaries. Many of the proposed changes are untested and unstudied and could result in significant loss of beneficiary choice, access and consumer protections."
But some of the proposal’s elements have won praise from seniors’ advocates. A plan to limit the number of Part D plans a company can offer in any one region – a proposal criticized by some Republican members of Congress for restricting seniors’ choices for coverage – may actually help ease confusion among seniors, said Joe Baker, president of the Medicare Rights Center.
“We observe that older adults and people with disabilities find choosing among a large number of Part D plans a dizzying experience,” he said. “Most people with Medicare fail to reevaluate their coverage options on an annual basis, largely because there are too many options and too many variables to compare.” [....]
Comments
The following recent Kaiser Health News article is the best one I have ever seen for
1) summarizing what is covered by Medicare and what is not and what might be done to change that
2) how the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003 (MMA) and the implementation of the Medicare drug benefit in 2006 introduced what might be called "means testing" into the system
and most importantly, something that I have found really hard to find
3) giving the actual numbers of how Medicare recipients are covered for what is not covered by Medicare
If you are nearing Medicare age and do not understand Medicare that well, I cannot recommend this article enough for getting the gist of it. There are things in here that took me a gazillion hours of digging deep into CMS gobbleygook and congressional bills and the like to figure out. Plus it has numbers.
by artappraiser on Mon, 03/03/2014 - 2:40pm
and footnotes thanks AA
by Resistance on Mon, 03/03/2014 - 10:39pm
by artappraiser on Tue, 03/04/2014 - 6:00pm
A minor point, re: cuts in payments for nursing homes and home health agencies.
I wonder how well that would sync with raising the minimum wage?
by artappraiser on Tue, 03/04/2014 - 6:07pm
by artappraiser on Tue, 03/04/2014 - 6:07pm
An editorial offered only because it does a decent job describing the proposed bill, not to support or dispute the LATimes' opinion:
by artappraiser on Tue, 03/04/2014 - 6:20pm
Don't worry, AA.
I'm cooled out about the whole thing.
You do a valuable thing in informing people on difficult topics, and (not that it needs saying or my permission is required) you're fully entitled to speak your mind.
Seriously.
I'm off this train of argument for good. It's tedious and leads nowhere.
by Peter Schwartz on Tue, 03/04/2014 - 6:45pm
Yez you got it, I was thinking of you when I wrote that intro to the article. I really really don't want to have to argue for or agin the LA. Times editiorial board opinion. Thank you for the comment, it helps.
by artappraiser on Tue, 03/04/2014 - 7:19pm
An round up of 6 news links on topic with summaries.
by artappraiser on Fri, 03/07/2014 - 1:09am
Has video, audio and transcript.
by artappraiser on Sun, 03/09/2014 - 3:07pm