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Health Advocates Rip Proposals for Stand-Alone Medicare Drug Benefit

Originally published by Reuters Health, April 17, 2002

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) — Advocates for America’s elderly and disabled today asked US Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-SD, to expand Part B of Medicare to include a prescription drug benefit and warned that proposals to create a separate drug benefit “would create needless delay and confusion.”

Creating a new Medicare Part D “would unduly complicate getting the ball to the goal line at all,” said Robert M. Hayes, president of the New York City-based Medicare Rights Center. “A simple way forward is to expand the drugs covered under part B. No need for further bureaucracy.”

Twelve consumer organizations and 16 individuals joined the Medicare Rights Center in a letter urging Daschle to create a universal, voluntary drug benefit under Medicare Part B. Building on Part B makes the most sense, they argued, because that part of the program already covers a short list of prescription drugs, such as injectable drugs to treat cancer.

Health advocates believe opponents of a “bona fide” drug benefit will use the complexity of creating a new benefit as another reason for defeating it. “There’s grave concern that some folks will be able to derail a new Part D benefit,” Hayes conceded in an interview with Reuters Health.

The letter comes as Democrats and Republicans on the US House Ways and Means Committee bickered today over how to provide prescription drug coverage to the nation’s senior citizens.

Health advocates, including the Center for Medicare Advocacy, in Willimantic, Connecticut, and the Universal Health Care Action Network, in Cleveland, recommend structuring the drug benefit like other Part B benefits, which require 20% co-insurance. They also suggest adding a low monthly premium as a supplement to the Part B premium and modestly raising the Part B deductible.