The share of traditional Medicare enrollees who bought Medicare Supplement coverage rose to 41% in 2021, compared to 35% in 2017, according to a report from America’s Health Insurance Plans. Medicare Supplement enrollees are three times less likely to have issues paying medical bills than those who only have traditional Medicare.
The House-Senate conferees now attempting to reconcile twoprofoundly flawed Medicare bills should go back to the drawingboard and use as a blueprint the 1999 majority recommendations ofthe National Bipartisan Commission on the Future of Medicare, whichproposed that Medicare beneficiaries be given a choice betweentraditional Medicare as it exists today and new, private plansoffering comprehensive, integrated benefits including fulloutpatient prescription drug coverage.
Millions of American seniors have worked hard their entire lives in the belief that they would receive health insurance benefits, including coverage for prescription drugs, from their employer after retirement. But if Congress does create a universal Medicare drug entitlement based on bills now before a House-Senate conference, the retiree drug coverage many seniors were promised by their employers will be in peril.