When Representative Paul D. Ryan faced a skeptical audience - and some boos - at the AARP convention in New Orleans on Friday, he tried to reassure them by noting that the Romney-Ryan health plan “makes no changes for those in or near retirement.â€
He was apparently referring to Mitt Romney‘s plan to reshape Medicare in a decade so that future recipients would get fixed amounts of money to buy private insurance or a form of traditional Medicare. But other aspects of their health plan would affect people in retirement now.
Overturning President Obama's health care law, as Mr. Romney has pledged to do, could wipe out several benefits that retirees are currently receiving because of the law. Chief among them are its provisions to help Medicare recipients pay for prescription drugs, to help cover the gap known as the “doughnut hole.†In the first eight months of this year, the Department of Health and Human Services said on Friday, the law helped the average recipient save $641 on drug coverage.
And Mr. Romney's proposal to cap Medicaid spending and turn it over to the states in block grants, which he estimates would save about $100 billion a year, could have an impact on the many older Americans who rely on Medicaid for their long-term care and nursing homes. A recent Medicaid primer by the Kaiser Family Foundation noted that “the elderly and individuals with disabilities make up about 25 percent of enrollees but about two-thirds of spending.â€
“Medicaid spending per capita in 2009 was $2,313 for children and $2,926 for non-disabled adults,†the primer said. “Per capita spending for the elderly ($13,186) and disabled ($15,453) was about seven times the per capita spending for children and adults. The elderly and disabled have higher utilization and intensity of use for acute care services, and the elderly and disabled are more likely to use long-term care services.â€
