May 5, 1971
Page 13538
NOTICE OF HEARINGS ON CUTBACKS IN MEDICARE AND MEDICAID PROGRAMS
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I wish to announce today that the Subcommittee on Health of the Senate Special Committee on Aging will hold a hearing next week concerning "Cutbacks in Medicare and Medi-Cal Coverage."
The hearing is scheduled to be held Monday, May l0 at the Board of Supervisors Hearing Room, room 381, Los Angeles Hall of Administration, 500 West Temple Street, Los Angeles, Calif. at 10 a.m.
As I stated at the organization meeting of the Committee on Aging in February, this hearing will be the first in a series the Subcommittee on Health will hold throughout the Nation examining the standards of health care that elderly Americans receive. We will be exploring the wide range of problems in delivering a decent level of health care to older Americans. The hearings will not only include an exploration of what appears to be inadequate financial assistance to the elderly for medical care, but also the equally serious problem of health manpower and health care delivery systems. Even if the elderly had – which they do not – adequate health insurance, such as that proposed by the Senator from Massachusetts, the elderly still would not receive decent health care, there are simply not enough doctors trained to treat the special problems of the elderly nor are our institutions of health care organized to deliver these special services.
The subcommittee is especially interested in delving into the area of home care health teams which would allow high quality medical services to be delivered to the elderly at home, avoiding the need for expensive hospitalization and the difficult problems of transportation for the elderly.
I hope also to investigate the need for creating rehabilitation services for the elderly. Right now, treatment for a stroke or a broken hip, if adequate, is not followed up by that kind of rehabilitation service that would allow the elderly to return to productive and happy lives.
Finally, there is the area of mental health care of the elderly, which needs detailed investigation.
These hearings will complement those being held by the Health Subcommittee of the Committee on Labor and Public Welfare regarding the financing of health insurance. The Health Subcommittee of the Committee on Aging does not intend to explore the areas of health insurance or alternative systems of financing health care.
Mr. President, at the end of these hearings, I hope we can recommend to the Congress specific proposals for modifying our health care systems to raise health care services for our older consumers to a decent level.