# Presentation: 025252

## Health Care

## Republican Economic Policies Threaten Health Care

- Health insurance premiums increased by 13.9 percent this year - the third year of double digit increases and the highest increase since 1990
- 43.6 million Americans are uninsured, an increase of 4 million since the beginning of the Bush Administration
- Over half of Medicare beneficiaries have no reliable prescription drug coverage

## No Action on What Matters to American Families

- Republicans have done nothing to bring down health care costs
- Republicans have done nothing to make health care more secure
- Republicans have passed a sham Medicare prescription drug bill that doesn’t lower prices, jeopardizes Medicare, and puts profits for HMOs and big drug companies ahead of seniors’ needs

## Medicare Prescription Drugs – the Republican Plan

- Designed to help HMOs and big drug companies, not seniors
- $17 billion slush fund for HMOs and big insurance companies
- $139 billion in windfall profits for pharmaceutical companies
- Forbids the government from negotiating discounts on drug prices
- Coverage gap that takes away benefits when they’re needed most

## Medicare Prescription Drugs – the Democratic Plan

- Guaranteed benefits under Medicare
- Lets government use the purchasing power of 40 million seniors to negotiate discounts
- No gap in coverage
- Designed to help seniors, not HMOs
- Would bring down drug prices

## Bush Economic Record3.8 Million More Americans Without Health Insurance

- Millions

- 39.8 million

- 43.6 million

## Increases in Health Care PremiumsPercent Increase in Health Care Premiums

**%**

**%**

**%**

**%**

**%**

**%**

**%**

**Source: Kaiser Family Foundation**

## The Republican Prescription Drug Plan Leaves Seniors Empty-Handed

- Deductible*

- Seniors pay 100% of prescription drug costs.
- About half of seniors fall into this gap.

- Coinsurance**

- Gap

- Second Tier***

- *Seniors pay 100%
- **Seniors pay 25%
- *** Seniors pay 5% or a $2.00 to $5.00 co-payment for each prescription, whatever is greater

- Total Spending by Beneficiary

***$250***

***$2,250***

***$5,100***

## Republican Plan Not AffordableRepublican Prescription Drug Plan Does Not Help Average Medicare Beneficiary

**$0**

**$500**

**$1,000**

**$1,500**

**$2,000**

**$2,500**

**$3,000**

**2003 Out-of-pocket cost**

**2007 Out-of-pocket cost**

- $250

- $500

- $1,685

- $420

**$2,318**

**$2,855**

**Annual Premium (estimated)**

**“****Doughnuthole”**

**Co-payment**

**Deductible**

## Democratic PlanProvides True Relief for Average Medicare Beneficiary

**$0**

**$500**

**$1,000**

**$1,500**

**$2,000**

**$2,500**

**2003 Out-of-pocket cost**

**2007 Out-of-pocket cost**

**$2,318**

**$780**

- $300

- $380

- $100

**Annual Premium**

**Co-payment**

**Deductible**

## What the Experts are Saying

- 	When seniors say they are waiting for a prescription drug benefit under Medicare, they mean exactly that.  No premium support.  No spending caps.  No subsidies for insurance plans that don’t want to play.  No threats to employer-provided coverage. At this late hour in the session, our simple message to the administration and members of Congress is this: If you are serious in your concern for seniors, stop trying to dismantle Medicare.
*	**--Barbara Kennelly, President, National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, 11/13/03**	*
- 	“President Bush proved once again that he is looking out for the profits of the pharmaceutical and insurance industries instead of the health care of seniors. What the administration and Congressional conferees are supporting will increase premiums and result in the loss of benefits for millions of retirees.... The Alliance [for Retired Americans] still believes no bill is better than a bad bill.”
*	**--Alliance for Retired Americans, 10/29/03*

## What the Experts are Saying

- 	Rep. Jo Ann Emerson (R-MO), who forced a vote for importation without a certification requirement as a condition of her vote for the House version of the bill, said the emerging deal could cost her vote the next time around. ‘_Obviously, the conferees are ignoring us and listening to the drug industry_,’ she said.”
*	**--The Wall Street Journal, “Big Drug Firms Gain in Medicare Talks.” 11/14/03*
*	*
- 	"This Congress, in our view, has missed an historic opportunity to finally provide prescription drug coverage to millions of senior citizens and people with disabilities who receive their health care through either the Medicare program alone or in coordination with the Medicaid program....  Our inability to support this bill stems from our overall concern that over the next decade, it shifts resources from a successful government program to the private, for-profit sector."
*	**--Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities, 11/20/03   *

## What the Experts are Saying

- 	The conference bill would also introduce a so-called premium support system in large parts of the country. This is an approach that Robert Reischauer and I described and christened seven years ago...A danger in such a plan, which we emphasized, is the risk that private insurers could use their power to design and market their plans selectively to attract relatively healthy customers..._Premiums for traditional Medicare would escalate, possibly resulting in a so-called death spiral, in which the extra premiums charged by traditional Medicare became unaffordable_...Unfortunately, the conference committee proposal provides no such safeguards, rendering the committee proposal too risky to adopt."
*	**--Henry Aaron, the Brookings Institution*