Health Reform to Strengthen Medicare Benefits

For more than four decades, Medicare has meant dignity and peace of mind for America's seniors—the peace of mind that comes from knowing that, no matter what, their health care is covered.

But now, as Congress works to reform America's health care system, and bring stable insurance coverage to every family, seniors are being exposed to confusing and sometimes false information about the future of Medicare. Seniors have even heard that health care reform will mean stripping them of their Medicare coverage. Nothing could be further from the truth: Forty-years ago, Medicare was created to provide seniors with reliable health care coverage they can count on, and now we are working to keep it strong for another forty years, and beyond.

For starters, we are planning to close the notorious Medicare Part D "donut hole." That hole in coverage has left seniors who have between $2,700 and $6,100 per year in prescription drug expenses without Medicare support—and it has, in the words of President Obama, placed "a crushing burden on many older Americans who live on fixed incomes." Now, we have an opportunity to relieve that burden.

Health care reform will include a strong, new package of benefits that includes strengthening support for lower-income patients, so all seniors can see their doctor whenever it's necessary. We also want to reward doctors for providing higher-quality, more cost-efficient care. That's why health care reform includes incentives for doctors in different specialties, or at different hospitals, to share information on patients and coordinate treatments. We can also save in the long run if patients go in for more preventive care—everything from blood pressure tests to cancer screenings—to nip the biggest problems in the bud. So under the current health reform plan, seniors will no longer have to worry about co-payments for preventive care.

In the long run, though, Medicare has to change to survive, because its current path cannot be sustained. Health care costs are skyrocketing across America, and Medicare is bracing itself for the retirement of the Baby Boomers, the biggest generation in our history. Its trust fund could be exhausted in as few as eight years. So we have to face up to some tough, unavoidable choices if we want to keep Medicare solvent for this generation of seniors, and for those to come.

Health care reform does mean finding savings to help ensure that seniors for years to come can rely on Medicare . But the majority of those savings are reinvested back into Medicare to improve seniors' benefits, protect doctors from that huge reduction in pay, and help the entire program stay solvent. The cuts also reduce the wasted dollars we lose to inaccurate payments and wasteful overpayments to private insurance plans, some of which receive up to 50% more than traditional Medicare for the same services.

For most seniors, Medicare is an absolute necessity. That's why it's so important to protect the qualities that have made it irreplaceable—and to ensure that our children and grandchildren will be able to turn to it in the future. As we work to bring quality, affordable care to all Americans, we are making sure that seniors can keep relying on Medicare for their peace of mind.