Obama Makes Clear: Medicare Benefits WILL NOT BE CUT
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Related subjects: Healthcare Policy, Legislation, Obama administration, Presidential Addresses, U.S. Economy, U.S. news, U.S. Politics Comments (1)
Perhaps the single most important tool Republicans have used to spur opposition to plans for healthcare reform —moreso even than their misuse of the word “socialism”— is their claim to seniors that Obama is planning to take your Medicare away. Currently proposed reforms have inefficiency cuts, designed to make Medicare more cost-effective, but not one part of the proposed reforms would reduce anyone’s benefits or access to care.
The cuts would be only a reduction in administrative waste or unnecessary multiple-testing, often done because doctors and hospitals seek to protect against lawsuits spurred by failure to test, and because they can bill for each new test. Administrative waste includes fraud and also cuts to existing subsidies to private insurance companies that in no way aid in providing care to Medicare recipients.
Pres. Obama tonight spoke directly to senior citizens, explaining that Medicare is a “sacred trust” that each generation needs to protect and pass on, and that as long as he is in office, he will fight to defend Medicare. He also noted that some of the people who’ve been making the false claim that he wants to cut benefits or ration care have themselves been staunch opponents of Medicare, going as far as to push for an alternate budget that would have resulted in cutting benefits.
Obama’s explanation of the distinction between cutting out waste, fraud and unnecessary payouts to private insurers, is central to his efforts to defend healthcare reform and steer the debate back toward serious policy matters. Opposition among some seniors, who had become convinced by false claims that they would see drastic cuts to their Medicare benefits or might even find they would have care rationed or be cut off if they became too ill, has been threatening to derail legislators’ support for broad reform.
But Pres. Obama went further than to just say Medicare will not be cut. He explained to viewers that the reforms currently under consideration would make it illegal for private health insurers to deny coverage or to deny care for “pre-existing conditions”, as well as making it illegal for them to put “arbitrary caps” on total coverage for any one illness or over a lifetime.
He also said “out-of-pocket expenses” would be capped to ensure no Americans are forced into bankruptcy simply because they got sick. The speech was the clearest and most resounding case he has made yet for the basic principles and for the practical approach being undertaken in order to achieve the goal of “quality, affordable healthcare” for all Americans.
It should be clear from this moment forward, was Obama’s message on Medicare as on so many other fine points of pending reforms: healthcare reform will not result in any cuts to anyone’s Medicare benefits. In fact, the reforms would bar any bureaucrat, government or private-sector, from interfering in the doctor-patient relationship or making decisions about course of treatment.
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