New 2010 Laws for Medicare Supplement Insurance “Medigap”

Numerous changes were made to the Medicare Supplement Plans available to seniors starting June 2010, including the elimination of several plans.

Beware:

Not all new plans are regular Traditional Medicare. Some companies will be selling Medicare Select Plans. Medicare Select Plans are not the same as a Traditional Plan F. Medicare Select Plans Restrict you to certain hospitals and providers!

Call me if anyone tries to sell you a plan F that seems too cheap!

If a person already has Medigap insurance, they have 30 days of “open enrollment” following their birthday each year when they may buy a new Medigap policy without a medical screening or a new waiting period. I recommend that anyone interested in the details and the cost of the new supplements call me at (800) 652-3555.

New Medicare Supplement Plans M and N.

Plans M and N Medicare Supplements have the least coverage and do NOT pay excess charges.

Cuts To Traditional Medicare

In order to help pay for Healthcare reform, money is being taken from Medicare!

Many people mistakenly thought that the Medicare cuts only apply to Medicare Advantage; however, the latest figures show that $136 billion will be taken from Medicare Advantage, but $397 billion will be taken from Traditional Medicare.

Gross cuts in projected payments to insurers, hospitals and other providers total $533 billion over 10 years, according to a preliminary analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

About $100 billion will be plowed back into Medicare, leaving a net cut of $428 billion.

We will not feel the effects of these cuts until after the elections.

Medicare needs every penny it can get. Why is it being used to finance Healthcare Reform?

Answer: Because it is easier for politicians to steal money from Medicare than it is to persuade their constituents to cough up another 500 billion dollars for an unnecessary bureaucracy.

One of the side effects of cuts to Medicare is that Medicare is one of the principle sources of funding for teaching hospitals. Experts predict a substantial shortage of doctors in the future that will likely be compounded by the reform legislation.

Can you afford it?

The California Senate has revived the bill that would create a single-payer, Public Option plan in the state. It wipes out everything that is working for people with insurance and replaces it with a 16% tax rate. The author of the California bill, Democratic State Senator Mark Leno, said it was basically a reintroduction of California Senate Bill 810 (a 2009 proposal that was effectively tabled because of its potential cost).

Democratic State Senator Christine Kehoe said a single-payer system would cost tens of billions of dollars a year. The bill is not the first attempt to set up a single-payer system in California. Two previous single-payer bills were passed by the legislature in recent years, only to be vetoed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. On Thursday, Gov. Schwarzenegger, again expressed his displeasure with the proposal, calling it at odds with fiscal reality. “The governor continues to oppose any single-payer government run health care sytem,” said Rachel Arrezola, a spokeswoman for Gov. Schwarzenegger.
Note: This bill would convert Traditional Medicare Plans to Medicare Advantage. Even if the bill passed and was signed by a new governor, it is probable that Californians would overturn the plan using a ballot measure.

History Repeats Itself

"The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest Rome become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance." - Cicero - 55 BC.

2010 AD. House leaders are using pathetically small deficit curbs to help smooth the way for the bill allowing the government to go $1.9 trillion deeper into debt over the next year, or about $6,000 more for every U.S. resident. The debt measure the House voted on raised the cap on federal borrowing to $14.3 trillion. That's enough money to keep Congress from having to vote again before the November elections. That way the tax payers will not be reminded just before the election that government spending is out of control and putting future generations under a mountain of debt.