Bipartisan deal to extend Medicare drug benefit

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Bipartisan deal to extend Medicare drug benefit

Susan Jaffe, The Plain Dealer

October 7, 2003

A tentative agreement between congressional Republicans and Democrats would save Ohio $275 million annually on medicine for seniors enrolled in Medicaid.

The agreement would extend the Medicare drug benefit Congress passed in June.

The nation's governors have lobbied for it over the objections of the Bush administration.

Prescription-drug benefits are the fastest growing part of the state's overburdened Medicaid budget, rising an average of 18 percent annually.

In 2001, the 222,339 seniors in Medicaid - who made up only 13 percent of Medicaid enrollees - accounted for almost half of Ohio 's Medicaid drug costs, according to the Ohio Department of Job & Family Services.

The Senate version of the bill excluded low-income seniors from the drug coverage that would be offered under Medicare, which provides health-care coverage for more than 40 million older Americans. The House's bill would include the seniors on Medicaid, a program for the nation's poor.

The congressional conference committee working to resolve differences in the two bills has tentatively agreed to accept the House position, according to congressional sources. Once a compromise on the two bills is crafted by the committee, it must be voted on in each house.

Without the extension, states would continue to pay about $6 billion in Medicaid costs for seniors. Adding the extension to the final legislation would not push the cost of the benefit over the $400 billion limit Congress set, said Christin Tinsworth, a staffer of Rep. Bill Thomas, a California Republican who chairs conference committee.

The nation's 50 governors had urged the committee to support the House version, and both Sens. Michael DeWine and George Voinovich agreed with the House approach.

"We're pleased that the conferees have been listening," said Orest Holubec, a spokesman for Gov. Bob Taft.

Last week, Taft signed a second letter addressed to Republican members of the conference committee asking for their support.

DeWine spokesman Mike Dawson said it makes no sense to have one government drug plan for low-income seniors and another for other seniors. Because the low-income Medicaid program involves state matching money, he said, states could decide to reduce or cut coverage.

"You would have a potential situation where the people who need the benefit the most and could afford it the least, wouldn't be covered," he said.

Medicaid drug coverage already differs from to state to state. For example, Ohio 's coverage is restricted to those with incomes at 64 percent of the poverty level.

Most states allow more people into the program by setting higher income limits.

The tentative agreement comes over the objections of Bush administration officials who claimed it wasn't necessary to extend the Medicare drug benefit to those seniors already receiving drugs under Medicaid.