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Medicare Enrollees May Be Able to Change 2020 Plans Later Due to Trump Admin Errors

The 2020 Medicare open enrollment period ends tomorrow — and it has not been the program’s finest hour. The Trump administration’s new online enrollment tools have been rightly criticized as inaccurate, misleading, and sometimes downright biased toward private plans.

With one day left in open enrollment, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has indicated that, because its online tools are riddled with errors, beneficiaries may be able to change their plans during a “special enrollment period” after the normal deadline.

“Saturday is the deadline for most people with Medicare coverage to sign up for private drug and medical plans for next year. But advocates worry that enrollment decisions based on bad information from the government’s revamped, error-prone Plan Finder website will bring unwelcome surprises.” – Kaiser Health News, 12/5/19

Read more from our new blog post by clicking here.

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Since at least 2018, the Trump administration has been tilting the playing field toward private Medicare Advantage plans over traditional Medicare.  In both print and online materials, CMS presents enrollee information in a way that makes Medicare Advantage seem like a better deal.

via Trump Admin Medicare Enrollment Tools Under Fire.

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on.mktw.net

Open enrollment tools still favor Medicare Advantage

Max Richtman

Medicare open enrollment season is supposed to be a time when enrollees can choose the best coverage based on accurate, unbiased information from the federal government. Unfortunately, the Trump administration’s enrollment tools show a continuing bias toward private Medicare Advantage (MA) plans over traditional Medicare.

This is not surprising. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), under its current leadership, seems to behave as if its main priority is to privatize the Medicare program.

Making Medicare coverage decisions is a complex task with multiple personal considerations. Beneficiaries need help understanding their options — including the pros and cons of traditional Medicare and private Medicare Advantage. They need to make fully informed choices given their existing and projected health needs, financial circumstances, and potential assistance with cost-sharing. In a 2018 poll of our organization’s members, more than half of respondents said they make enrollment decisions through online research.

Read more from this op-ed by clicking here.

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The Trump administration on Friday announced it would begin forcing hospitals to publicly disclose the discounted prices they negotiate with insurance companies, a potentially bold move to help people shop for better deals on a range of medical services, from hip replacements to brain scans.

“For decades, hospitals, insurance companies, lobbyists and special interests have hidden prices from consumers, so they could drive up costs for you, and you had no idea what was happening,” President Trump said Friday afternoon in the White House’s Roosevelt Room. “You’d get bills that were unbelievable and you’d have no idea why.”

via New York Times.

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The Trump administration is engaged in a massive deception about Medicare Advantage plans, those commercial insurance plans that contract with the government to offer Medicare benefits. These plans are offered as an alternative to traditional Medicare, the public plan administered by the government.

For far too long, politicians and corporations have marketed these commercial plans to unwary older adults and people with disabilities as a “new and improved” Medicare. That’s deceptive. Unlike traditional Medicare, these plans strip their members of the right to choose their own doctors and hospitals. Their cumbersome rules often lead to arbitrary delays and denials of care, and they can leave members with enormous unexpected costs.

Buyers, beware. The Trump administration, much like the Medicare Advantage corporations themselves, is pushing these commercial plans on people without mentioning these risks and costs. But, they can’t be honest about Medicare Advantage. If they were, they would have to admit that these plans—like commercial health insurance in general—typically come up short on key metrics such as affordability, access, choice, efficiency, and accountability.

via Common Dreams.

Related Reading:

Trump Administration Continues Tilting the Field toward Medicare Advantage.

During the Medicare open enrollment period that ends today, the Trump administration once again asked beneficiaries to choose plans without the benefit of accurate, unbiased information. Throughout this period and the year preceding it, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has unabashedly steered seniors toward private Medicare Advantage plans, while downplaying traditional Medicare.

Case-in-point: The New York Times reported that CMS has been sending emails to millions of beneficiaries encouraging enrollment in Medicare Advantage. The emails uncannily resemble advertising from big insurance companies. Effectively, that’s what they are.

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reut.rs

Medicare Advantage plans get unfair push from U.S. government: critics

Insurance companies do not need any help marketing Medicare Advantage plans - just ask anyone over age 65 about the pitches that clog their mailboxes every year during the fall enrollment period, or check out the television ads that flood cable channels.

So why is the federal government giving these private all-in-one plans an extra marketing push? That is the question raised by two consumer advocacy groups, who charge that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is improperly urging enrollees to pick Advantage plans in ways that tip the scales against traditional fee-for-service Medicare.

Medicare Advantage plans roll together coverage for hospitalization, outpatient services and prescription drugs that are provided through separate parts of traditional Medicare.

via Reuters.

Related Reading:

Trump Administration Continues Tilting the Field toward Medicare Advantage.

The website features a list of Medicare options, with Medicare Advantage plans at the top. “Original Medicare” is absent from the list. A new beneficiary could be forgiven for not even knowing that original Medicare exists.  This is confusing – and misleading.

Unlike Advantage plans, original Medicare does not limit patients to a fixed network of providers, giving patients access to the best doctors and hospitals. Original Medicare covers beneficiaries when they are traveling. And, in combination with a supplemental Medigap policy, original Medicare insulates patients against high out of pocket costs. This bedrock health insurance program has served hundreds of millions of seniors for more than 50 years – with low overhead and no profit motive.

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Older Americans have been flocking to Medicare’s private plans, which promise predictable costs and extra benefits.

But the private Medicare Advantage plans have also been getting an unpublicized boost from the Trump administration, which has in the last few weeks extolled the virtues of the private plans in emails sent to millions of beneficiaries.

Medicare’s annual open enrollment period closes on Friday. Administration officials predict that almost 37 percent of the 60 million Medicare beneficiaries will be in Medicare Advantage plans next year, up from 28 percent five years ago.

via New York Times.

Related Reading:

Draft Medicare Handbook Biased Toward Private Plans.

A draft handbook on Medicare enrollment has drawn criticism from senior’s advocates – and rightly so. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released the draft for review in advance of mailing a final version to 43 million households this September. 

What bothers advocates is the handbook’s apparent bias toward private Medicare Advantage plans over traditional Medicare – using inaccurate and misleading information.

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Rural, low-income voters who helped propel President Trump to victory in 2016 are less likely to have health insurance than the urban poor in states that didn’t expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act.

A new study compared uninsured rates from 2008-2009 and 2015-2016 by the the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families and the University of North Carolina Rural Health Research Program. It examined insurance coverage in 46 states with significant rural populations and found a disparity between low-income adults living in rural areas and small towns versus those living in metropolitan areas.

via Washington Post.

Related Reading:

We have been keeping track of President Trump and his administration’s actions on Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and health care.

You can view that timeline here.

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wapo.st

Trump administration considers tax cut for the wealthy

The Treasury Department is considering a tax cut for the wealthiest Americans through a change that would not need approval from Congress, officials said, a move that would follow a package of tax cuts last year that also benefited the super-rich.

The agency is studying whether to allow investment income, known as capital gains, to be adjusted for inflation in a way that shields more of it from taxation. Most capital gains are paid by wealthier Americans, who disproportionately hold large portfolios of investments.

But the use of executive power on such a significant change to the tax law would be highly unusual and could be vulnerable to a legal challenge. Senior administration officials have discussed whether to proceed but have not concluded they have legal authority to do so. The move was rejected during the George H.W. Bush administration because it was seen as outside the scope of Treasury’s authority and only attainable via an act of Congress.

via Washington Post.

Related Reading:

So, the Trump administration wants to give the wealthy ANOTHER tax cut?!

Here’s what the last tax cut did for the wealthy and how the working class will pay for them.

How about BOOSTING Social Security for
the working class?

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A broad swath of health-care constituencies weighed in on Thursday to oppose a lawsuit challenging the Affordable Care Act, forming an uncommonly united front against a decision by the Trump administration not to defend significant parts of the law.

via Washington Post.

Related Reading:

How the Affordable Care Act Helps Seniors.

• The ACA provides new ways to help hospitals, doctors and other health care providers coordinate care for beneficiaries so that health care quality is improved and unnecessary spending reduced. 
  
• Improvements made in the ACA to Medicare preventive services and prescription drug coverage have lowered the out-of-pocket costs of millions of seniors. Below are some of the ways that the Affordable Care Act is helping seniors.