Health care expenditures would double for the elderly in every state by 2022 if the Republican plan for Medicare is implemented. This is the finding of a detailed analysis of the Ryan plan for turning Medicare into a voucher program where the government’s cost would be fixed, leaving seniors to cover more of their health care costs.

According to the report by the US Congress Joint Economic Committee, if Medicare remains as is, Seniors in Arizona can expect to pay, on average, $5,364 out-of-pocket for their health care costs in 2022. Under the Ryan voucher version of Medicare, seniors in Arizona can expect to pay out $10,906 in 2022.

Analysis of the Ryan plan compared to traditional Medicare was carried out by the US Congress Joint Economic Committee. The report provides a state-by-state analysis of the Republican proposal’s impact on the health care costs of the typical 65-year-old in 2022. The report finds that the Republican plan for Medicare will double the out-of-pocket health care expenses of the elderly in every state, with some paying over $7,000 more than what they would have paid under traditional Medicare.

Excerpts from the committee report:

Under the Republican plan, Medicare will no longer function as a health insurance provider. Instead, Medicare beneficiaries will only receive a payment that they could use to purchase private health insurance. Medicare beneficiaries will bear the full brunt of all remaining health care expenses not covered by their insurance provider. Moreover, the Republican plan reopens the “donut hole,” which is the gap in Medicare Part D that had forced beneficiaries to pay 100 percent of their drug costs after they exceeded an initial coverage limit and until they qualified for catastrophic coverage. As a consequence, millions of older Americans will pay higher prescription drug costs.

Medicare is a lifeline for older Americans. The Republican Medicare plan will force millions of elderly Americans to pay more for medical care and could accelerate the rise in health care costs. More ominously, the Republican plan steers Medicare away from the goal the program has aspired to achieve for nearly five decades, which is to provide older Americans with universal access to high‐quality, affordable health insurance in their retirement years.

How did a Democrat win a Congressional seat in a district that always votes overwhelmingly Republican?  Medicare is the answer.  The Associated Press described the results:

The Democrat rode a wave of voter discontent over the national GOP’s plan to change Medicare and overcame decades of GOP dominance here to capture Tuesday’s special election in New York’s 26th Congressional District.

…The special election that became a referendum on the health care plan for the nation’s seniors may serve as a warning shot to further GOP efforts to cut popular entitlement programs.

The Democratic candidate, Kathy Hochul, got the message right by saying we can’t decimate Medicare while giving billions of dollars in tax breaks to oil companies. It’s a simple message and it resonates with voters: young, old, independent, and even Republicans.

This was a special election to fill a seat in Congress vacated by a Republican who left office amid a scandal over his Craig’s List pick up posts and picture (looking buff with no shirt on). He was a married man who had campaigned on family values.  Yuck!  That guy won the 2008 election with 70% of the vote.

Republicans have attacked their own who have dared to speak against the Paul Ryan plan to turn Medicare into a  voucher system and hand it over to insurance companies.  The House of Representatives recently voted for the Ryan budget, and almost every Republican endorsed ending Medicare as we know it – or as Newt Gingrich put it,  “radical social engineering”. Democrats in the Senate will force a vote on the Ryan budget soon, so Republican senators can go on record with their position on the future of Medicare.

I’m looking forward to 2012 as I continue to blog about Medicare. What fun this is  going to be!

I got a call last week from a woman who has a health insurance policy with a $100,000 lifetime coverage limit. This means the insurance company won’t pay any more than $100,000 in insurance claims for this lady, who is 61 years old.  When the limit is met, the insurance policy is canceled – and this lady will have no health insurance.

Jane (not her real name), got this policy a few years back when her husband retired and went on Medicare.  Jane needed to get individual health insurance and wanted to keep her monthly premium  low.  So she “took a chance” (as she said) and signed up for a policy with a fairly low lifetime limit of $100,000.

Jane told me she had always been healthy, so she figured she wouldn’t need more than $100,000 in medical care over a six year period until she would get Medicare.  She said she was hiking Mt. Lemon one weekend and the next week she was in the hospital having triple bi-pass surgery….and worrying about her health insurance.

If Jane’s medical bills exceed $100,000, she will no longer have health insurance. She wanted me to help her get new coverage. Unfortunately for Jane, she is probably un-insurable with her recent medical history and her pre-existing heart condition.  I gave Jane a list of things she can do to see if she can get health insurance  – but I think she is in big trouble.

I told Jane that the Affordable Care Act (aka “Obamacare”) requires lifetime limits for health insurance policies be raised each year until there will be no limit in 2014. The minimum coverage limit this year is $750,000. But the law applies only to plans sold after September 2010. Jane bought her policy two years ago, so it should be exempt from the new requirements… meaning she is out of luck.

A 2009 report by Price Waterhouse Coopers (PwC), a major accounting/consulting firm, looked at the impact of lifetime limits on individuals, insurance premiums, and Medicaid.

Findings from the study:

In 2009, 55 % of people who got their health insurance from employers were subject to lifetime limits, and this number was growing as health insurance premiums continue to rise each year.

The most common lifetime limits on health insurance policies were $1 million or $2 million in 2009.

20,000 to 25,000 people hit their lifetime limit in 2009 – meaning they no longer had health insurance, even though they were employed. The study projected that over 300,000 people would hit their lifetime limits by 2019 because of rising health care costs.

Increasing lifetime limits from $1 million to $5 million would increase premiums by only $3 per month, or .6% for an individual. Family plan premiums would rise by about $8. Increasing limits to $10 million would increase premiums by one-tenth of one percent according to the study.

Because many people who lose their health insurance end up on Medicaid, states would save $1 billion in 2010 if lifetime limits were raised or eliminated.

So it is clear that raising (or eliminating) lifetime limits will save the government money and will protect the health  and finances of working people –  and people like Jane.

This is one more example of how the Affordable Care Act is helping people while saving the government money.  So why do Republicans want to repeal it?