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The Medicare finger-pointing is accelerating [1]
['Rachel Roubein']
Date: 2023-02-10
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Democrats and Republicans are trading Medicare cut accusations
The partisan feud over cuts to Medicare and Social Security is escalating.
President Biden used a trip to Florida to hit Republicans on the popular entitlements and accuse Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) of seeking to gut the programs many people in his state benefit from.
In an attempt to turn the tables, several GOP lawmakers — including Sens. Steve Daines (Mont.) and Tom Cotton (Ark.) — in recent days have charged the Biden administration with proposing cuts to private Medicare plans used by roughly 30 million people.
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Both sides are pushing back hard against those characterizations, as the days-long back-and-forth underscores just how politically treacherous it has become to even marginally discuss changes to entitlement programs, which are considered the third rail of American politics. The effort from Biden to elevate the idea of Republican cuts to the programs — which we expect he will continue to do— indicates how potent an issue he believes it could be during a potential reelection bid.
“I know that a lot of Republicans, their dream is to cut Social Security and Medicare,” Biden said in Tampa. “Well, let me say this: If that’s your dream, I’m your nightmare.”
More from Biden:
Time for Republicans on the Hill to wake up. pic.twitter.com/gyDG2QSDqG — President Biden (@POTUS) February 9, 2023
The details
This moment has been building for months.
In the final weeks of the midterms, Democrats launched a last-minute attack: Republicans are a threat to Social Security and Medicare.
Then, some Republicans raised the notion of seeking cuts in their quest to balance the budget within a decade, prompting House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) to say that was off the table in the debt ceiling fight. Biden sparked an uproar from the GOP during the State of the Union when he asserted some Republican-backed plans could lead to cuts.
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This all encapsulates a new political reality: Leaders of both parties have become unwilling to discuss changes to entitlement programs, even as they become closer to financial insolvency, our colleague Jeff Stein notes. That’s to the chagrin of some experts who are frustrated by the partisan politics and argue changes to the programs are needed to keep them afloat.
“My heart dropped to the bottom” during the State of the Union address when lawmakers in the chamber concluded there wouldn’t be a rethinking of the two programs,” G. William Hoagland, a senior vice president at the Bipartisan Policy Center who worked for former Senate majority leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), told The Health 202. “The truth of the matter is, if we do not do something with Social Security and Medicare, there will be a cut.”
Looking ahead
The next GOP talking point? That might just be around Medicare Advantage. Several Republicans are contending the Biden administration is making cuts to private Medicare plans.
It’s an argument the industry is making, with the Better Medicare Alliance — which advocates for Medicare Advantage — sending a memo, as first reported by Politico, to Capitol Hill this week. In an interview, Mary Beth Donahue, BMA’s president and CEO, called proposed payment rates for 2024 released last week a “detrimental cut” and said her group was still analyzing “the complexities of the proposal.”
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But top federal health officials see it differently. They say their calculations show their plan — which includes an increase in the growth of benchmarks used to determine MA payment, updates to coding that shows the health of enrollees and more — would lead to a roughly 1 percent increase in payments.
“[We] think it’s really important not to cherry-pick the numbers,” Chiquita Brooks-LaSure , the head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services , said yesterday on a call with reporters.
“We’re aware of that criticism, and we strongly disagree. We have proposed an increase in Medicare Advantage payments,” said a senior Department of Health and Human Services official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to be candid, told The Health 202. The official said the proposal made “technical updates” to the payment system that are “good practices” and were made in traditional Medicare years ago.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.):
It's President Biden who is proposing to cut Medicare Advantage, a program used by almost 4 in 10 Arkansas seniors.
This would be a mistake.
https://t.co/2GFxa0AT7z — Tom Cotton (@TomCottonAR) February 6, 2023
From our reporters' notebooks
What ending the coronavirus public health emergency really means
Our colleague Amy Goldstein sends us this dispatch:
The Department of Health and Human Services yesterday issued a compilation of what will and won’t change once it ends the coronavirus public health emergency in May.
The details: The list was included with an official notice to the nation’s governors that HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra intends on Feb. 11 to sign a 90-day renewal of the emergency for a final time. The letter followed the White House’s notification to Congress the end of last month that the administration plans to allow the emergency to expire more than three years after it was first created by the Trump administration in January 2020 during the pandemic’s early days.
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On vaccines: The five-page fact sheet says “many Americans will continue to pay nothing out-of-pocket for the coronavirus vaccine.” That is because vaccines recommended by an advisory committee to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are classified as preventive care for most private health insurance, so they are fully covered without any co-payment. The vaccines also will continue to be covered under Medicare, the federal insurance for the elderly and disabled. For low-income Americans on Medicaid, HHS said, all coronavirus vaccines will be covered at no cost at least through September 2024.
On coronavirus tests: On the other hand, people on Medicare will no longer be able to get free at-home coronavirus tests — only when a health-care practitioner orders a test evaluated by a medical lab. And insurance companies will be able to decide whether to continue covering either at-home or laboratory coronavirus tests. If supplies and funding are available, the government may continue to distribute tests from the Strategic National Stockpile.
On reporting test results: Also, once the emergency ends, labs no longer will be required to report coronavirus test results to the CDC. That change, HHS predicts, could make it more difficult to calculate the percent of positive results in states and communities unwilling to enter into voluntary data-sharing arrangements with the federal government.
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HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra:
We’ve made a lot of progress against COVID. Since end of Jan 2022:
- Daily cases ⬇️92%
- Deaths ⬇️over 80%
- New hospitalizations ⬇️nearly 80%
As I told governors in a letter, COVID remains a priority, but we can transition away from the emergency phase.
https://t.co/gWPDdC5yDw — Secretary Xavier Becerra (@SecBecerra) February 10, 2023
Coronavirus
CDC adds coronavirus shots to list of routine vaccines for kids, adults
Coronavirus vaccines have been added to the list of routine immunizations recommended by the CDC for children, adolescents and adults.
The updated guidance doesn’t mandate the shots for schools or workplaces. The CDC doesn’t have the authority to require vaccines; that decision is left up to states and local jurisdictions. Instead, the vaccine schedule summarizes the agency’s recommendations for physicians on which shots their patients should receive and when.
Meanwhile …
The Federal Emergency Management Agency announced it will close all covid-19 disaster declaration incident periods on May 11, when the Biden administration plans to end the coronavirus national and public health emergencies.
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The agency’s funeral assistance program, however, will continue, allowing families who lose loved ones to covid-19 to recoup up to $9,000 in expenses related to funeral services, Reuters reports.
State scan
Democrats look to make Maryland an abortion ‘safe haven’
Maryland’s top Democrats are seeking to create “a safe haven for abortion,” joining a growing wave of blue states ramping up efforts to protect patients, providers and access to the procedure, The Post’s Erin Cox writes.
At a news conference yesterday, Gov. Wes Moore (D) announced his support for Democratic House Speaker Adrienne Jones’s years-long quest to have voters enshrine abortion rights in the Maryland constitution, fortifying protections in state law as federal ones erode.
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The bigger picture: The effort to codify abortion rights in Maryland stalled in years past, but it took on new urgency after the U.S. Supreme Court relegated the issue back to the states and more than a dozen, including neighboring West Virginia, banned the procedure. The push for more abortion protection in Maryland arrives just as Democrats have expanded their supermajorities in the state.
Maryland Gov. Wes Moore (D):
Today, Maryland took the first step toward enshrining reproductive rights in our state’s constitution.
Together, we will make Maryland a safe haven for abortion access. pic.twitter.com/s3ESaLd63O — Governor Wes Moore (@GovWesMoore) February 9, 2023
In other health news
The Senate Judiciary Committee voted to advance several bipartisan bills yesterday such as measures boosting transparency over pharmacy middlemen and expanding access to generic medications. such as measures boosting transparency over pharmacy middlemen and expanding access to generic medications.
The deadline for a looming court ruling that could revoke government approval of a key abortion drug and take the pills off the market nationwide Caroline Kitchener notes. and take the pills off the market nationwide has been pushed to Feb. 24, although a final decision will likely come later than that, our colleaguenotes.
Cigarette giant Reynolds American filed a citizen petition this week urging the Food and Drug Administration to Stat’s Nicholas Florko reports. to crack down on manufacturers of disposable e-cigarettes, which are becoming increasingly popular among young users,’sreports.
Quote of the week
Health reads
Sugar rush
Thanks for reading! See y’all Monday.
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[1] Url:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/02/10/medicare-finger-pointing-is-accelerating/
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