10 July 2004

Drug-card beneficiaries aren't those on Medicare

If the new Medicare drug discount cards are so good, why doesn't the Bush administration want as many people as possible to have them?

As part of the so-called Medicare "reform" bill that passed Congress late last year, the government authorized the cards. They cost about $30 a year, and beneficiaries can use them until the law takes effect fully in 2006. For all the debate over whether the cards save people money on drugs, health-care experts acknowledge that those most likely to benefit from them are the poorest Medicare recipients. So lawmakers from both parties have urged the government to automatically issue cards to the poor.

But the Bush administration has refused, saying that forced enrollment might disrupt the "competition" that is supposed to result from the billions in subsidies that were put in the bill to make it seem as if Washington had done something for retirees during an election year. Since the White House and Republicans in Congress expressly forbid Medicare from doing the one thing that would reduce costs -- use the program's bulk-buying power to negotiate prices -- this is more evidence that the Medicare "reform" bill was designed for private business, not Medicare beneficiaries.

In fact, the man who wrote much of the law is profiting from it. Thomas Scully, who was Medicare's administrator at the time, has quit government to become a lobbyist for drug firms and others that will benefit from the legislation. This week came confirmation that Mr. Scully ordered Medicare's chief actuary not to tell Congress that the real cost of the "reform" bill would be about $550 billion, not $400 billion, as the Bush administration had claimed. Conveniently, Medicare investigators said Mr. Scully's actions were not criminal.

AARP, which foolishly supported the "reform" law, released a study last week claiming that drug companies raised prices at three times the rate of inflation just before the discount cards took effect. Neither the White House nor the companies denied the report; their responses were that any price hikes were coincidental and that discounts from the cards are more than offsetting any increases.

That argument might be easier to believe if there were any indication that the White House and the Republican leadership in Congress have been serious about Medicare "reform." Instead, the priority is to make sure that "reform" doesn't disturb the companies that run the health-care system.

Palm Beach Post Editorial

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