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Two years ago, Congress enacted a Medicare
prescription drug benefit that represents the first
significant modernization of the program since its
inception in 1965. Enrollment for this program, know
as the Medicare Part D drug benefit, began last
November and
starting January 1st of this year, every
Medicare beneficiary has access to affordable
prescription drug coverage. This benefit is
completely voluntary and all Medicare beneficiaries
are eligible, including over 90,000 of Maine’s most
vulnerable seniors who will receive additional
financial assistance through the plan.
Implementing a new benefit- especially
one as massive as this one- is bound to result in
some errors. Many seniors are confused and angry
that they do not have adequate information about the
plans being offered-- and for good reason since
there are more than 40 plans to choose from and
finding the best one can be overwhelming. Seniors in
Maine are worried they could make a poor choice in
selecting a plan and that, once enrolled, the drugs
offered by the plan they choose may not be the drugs
they need. There have also been recent discoveries
of significant problems with the Centers for
Medicare and Medicaid’s (CMS) signup services.
We absolutely must ensure that seniors who are
depending on Medicare prescription drug coverage
find the plan that best meets their needs. Indeed,
the federal government should be doing everything
within its power to make it easier for seniors to
navigate the system and correctly choose which plan
would work best for them. That is why I, along with
Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) have introduced a
bipartisan plan to address some of the problems that
seniors have been having with the drug benefit
signup. This legislation gives seniors more time to
sign up for the new Medicare prescription drug
benefit, provides more flexibility for beneficiaries
to change plans, and adds crucial protections for
those enrolled in a plan. Our bill represents an
opportunity to alleviate much of this confusion and
make sure the new drug benefit starts out on the
right foot.
The Medicare Drug Benefit Protections Act of 2005
extends the initial six-month period for enrolling
in a plan from May 15, 2006, to December 31, 2006,
thus delaying late enrollment penalties until 2007
and giving beneficiaries all year to decide whether
to enroll in a plan. Once beneficiaries have
enrolled in a plan, the bill guarantees them a
one-time opportunity during 2006 to change to
another plan without penalty, should they wish to do
so.
Under our bill, beneficiaries could change plans
without penalty if they relied on misinformation
from CMS to their detriment. There are serious
problems with inaccurate drug pricing information
being provided by the CMS website devoted to the new
Medicare Part D plans, www.medicare.gov. In
one instance, the CMS website quoted one price for a
senior's drug costs for 2006 but the plan itself
quoted a cost of approximately $2,000 more than the
CMS website. The bill also authorizes $25 million
in funds for grants to states and nonprofit
organizations to conduct additional outreach efforts
during 2007 and 2008. Such outreach efforts are
crucial to the success of the program given the
scale of the benefit and the large number of
beneficiaries.
The new Medicare prescription drug
benefit is an essential program for many seniors
struggling to pay their medical drug bills. But
seniors in Maine and across the country deserve more
time to decide what kind of prescription drug
coverage is right for them to make sure that they
are not saddled with unnecessary monthly premiums.
The legislation I have co-sponsored is a commonsense
approach that fixes many of the problems that
seniors are having with trying to sign up for the
benefit. This drug benefit is a chance for many
seniors to drastically reduce the price of their
prescription drugs and so we absolutely must ensure
that they are given all the information, help, and
time they need to reap the benefits of this program.
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