June 30, 1973
Page 22587
SYLVIA PORTER ATTACKS NIXON HEALTH PROPOSAL
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, the Nation's elderly are becoming more and more incensed with the Nixon administration proposal to add to their already heavy burden of medical costs by imposing new deductibles and coinsurance increases in the medicare program. This has become very apparent to me as I have presided over hearings on "Barriers to Health Care for Older Americans" as chairman of the Subcommittee on Health of the Elderly, Senate Special Committee on Aging.
Therefore, I was delighted to see that the renowned columnist on money matters and consumer interests, Sylvia Porter, has written a hard-hitting article citing some of the findings from the hearings and exposing this proposal for what it truly is: "a brutally callous way of reducing Federal budget expenses."
Miss Porter rightly points out:
Today's average elderly citizen already pays far more in direct, out-of-pocket costs for medical care than in 1966 – an average of $404 in fiscal 1972, or $95 more than in fiscal 1966, before Medicare went into effect.
She adds:
The Nixon Administration is trying to cut budget costs by asking the elderly to assume in the coming fiscal year an extra $500 million and, later, an additional $1 billion in Medicare hospital costs.
These Medicare cutbacks, politely referred to as a cost-sharing plan are being proposed at a time of surging food costs, lifting of rent controls in many cities, climbing prices across the board (including out-of-pocket costs of health care not covered by Medicare), reductions or eliminations of Federal housing subsidies.
Mr. President, I want to state again my opposition to the Nixon medicare proposals, which are callous in the extreme, and I ask unanimous consent that the June 28 Sylvia Porter article "Nixon
Plan Hits at Elderly Sick" be printed in the RECORD.
There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:
NIXON PLAN HITS AT ELDERLY SICK
(By Sylvia Porter)
Q: What two things do the following expenses have in common?
Out-of-hospital prescription drugs, routine physical exams and immunizations, routine eye exams for glasses, hearing aids, dentures, routine dental care, orthopedic shoes, custodial nursing home care.
A: They are all "normal" medical care expenses of elderly Americans;
And they are among the key items which are not covered at all by Medicare.
For entirely appropriate and defensible economic reasons, the Nixon administration is fighting to curb the year-to-year increases in our national budget. We cannot even hope to lower the rate of annual rise in our cost of living to tolerable limits until we get our budget back under control.
But defending the budget objectives and defending the priorities in the Nixon budget are scarcely in the same sphere.
Today's average elderly citizen already pays far more in direct, out-of-pocket costs for medical care than in 1966 – an average of $404 in fiscal '72, or $95 more than in fiscal '66, before Medicare went into effect.
Many medical care costs are far higher for Medicare patients than they were at Medicare's beginning eight years ago.
It is against this background that the Nixon administration is trying to cut budget costs by asking the elderly to assume in the coming fiscal year an extra $500 million and, later, an additional $1 billion in Medicare hospital costs.
Instead of today's $72 deductible from the cost of the first day hospitalization, the elderly patient would have to pay the full cost of the first day. Today's average hospital room rate is more than $72 a day – nearly as much as the minimum monthly Social benefit of $84.50.
Instead of today's free hospitalization (after the $72 deductible up to the 6lst day), the patient would be required to pay 10 percent of his or her hospital costs, whatever the length of stay.
Thus, if an elderly person had to spend 60 days in the hospital, the cost would be raised from today's $72 to at least $500.
The deductible under Medicare's Part B also would be raised under the administration plan from the first $60 of doctor bills to the first $85, and the patient would be required to pay 25 percent of the costs above that, against 20 percent today.
Federal backing for such "low priority" Medicare services as dental care for the indigent – including the elderly – would be eliminated by the Nixon plan.
These Medicare cutbacks, politely referred to as a "cost-sharing" plan are being proposed at a time of surging food costs, lifting of rent controls in many cities, climbing prices across the board (including out-of-pocket costs of health care not covered by Medicare), reductions or eliminations of federal housing subsidies.
By one count, in 1969, Medicare paid for 45 percent of total health expenses for the elderly; today that proportion is down to about 42 percent, and under the. Nixon plan, would plummet to 35 percent.
Moreover, state after state has been putting through cutbacks in the Medicaid program – the "next step down" after Medicare.
To suggest what the Nixon plan could mean; a delegation from the New York City Office of Aging gave this testimony before the Senate Special Committee on Aging:
A chronic heart disease patient in New York City would be forced to pay 358 percent more in hospital costs than today and 27 percent more in doctor bills.
In the words of Nelson Cruikshank, president of the National Council of Senior Citizens, this is an "outrageous and unconscionable scheme to steal from the elderly sick."
In the words of Sen. Edmund Muskie, D-Me., chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Health of the Elderly. "This plan could, in fact, increase costs for all concerned – the elderly, the government and the health industry – without improving the quality of health services. The increased charges might actually discourage timely care that could prevent institutionalization or prolonged treatment."
And should you also agree this is a brutally callous way of reducing federal budget expenses, you have plenty of company. According to a recent Louis Harris poll, 92 percent of the American public are opposed to this plan – making it the most unpopular of any administration cost-cutting proposal.