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7/29/2008 - Celebrating Medicare on its 43rd Birthday Extending the Life-span by One-Third
Celebrating Medicare on its 43rd Birthday Extending the Life-span by One-Third
President Lyndon B. Johnson signed Medicare into law on July 30, 1965. Former President Harry Truman and his wife Bess are on the far right.
Val J. Halamandaris, President of the National Association for Home Care and Hospice (NAHC), who as a young man worked with the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging to help enact Medicare, today hailed the program's 43rd anniversary as "a gift to the people of America which will become more valuable with each passing year."
Medicare was signed into law on July 30, 1965, by President Lyndon B. Johnson.
"Medicare is a contract with the American people. It is not a welfare or entitlement program as some wish to classify it. Rather, it is the fulfillment of a commitment between generations, administered by the Federal government. Medicare is a social insurance program which returns 98 cents on every dollar back to the insured in the form of benefits, as opposed to private insurance plans which at their best return an average of only 83 cents on the dollar. All Americans - rich or poor - pay into Medicare during their working life to support those over 65 with the explicit promise that future workers will support them when they reach retirement age and experience the need for health care. The genius of Medicare is that it is not a handout but an earned right, paid for by all and available to all," said Halamandaris.
Halamandaris said that Medicare is "a national health insurance program for the elderly and disabled Americans which, although far from perfect, provides a workable platform for a national health solution to covering not just the 46 million uninsured but all Americans."
"The success of Medicare can be measured in many ways by examining both the past and the present," said Halamandaris. In 1960, President John F. Kennedy promised to enact Medicare as a central part of his presidency because older Americans:
a.) Were sick three times as often as the general population,
b) Experienced hospital stays three times as long as the younger population,
c) Had health bills which on average were three times that of their younger counterparts spent at a time when they were making a third of the income of their younger colleagues, and
d) Because private health insurance was unavailable - it could not be purchased by those over 65."
According to Halamandaris, the private health insurance industry at that time said that it was impossible to extend insurance coverage to seniors without going broke. In commenting on legislation that would require them to provide such coverage the industry said that this would be like mandating that they provide automobile insurance that would cover only bad drivers. Today seniors are still sick more often and spend more time seeking medical care, but they are no longer impoverished by the cost of obtaining such care.
The number of over-65 Americans has increased from 16.5 million in l960 to 37.8 million today. During this same time frame the ratio of elderly citizens to the total population in the U.S. increased from 9% to 12.5%, and is expected to increase to 13% in 2010. Those individuals who live to be 65 have a 2-to-l chance of living to be 80. In fact, the fastest growing segment of the American public is those individuals that are over 85. Medicare has helped produce the specter of 76 million baby boomers that will begin to hit 65 in 2011.
"Thanks to Medicare there have been major advances against heart disease, stroke, pulmonary disease, arthritis and cancer. Historians will say of Medicare that it extended life expectancy by one-third, that it made it possible for the first time to have a massive segment of long-lived Americans who manifest both the biology of youth and the wisdom born of experience," said Halamandaris.
"There are those who say America cannot afford Medicare but I say we cannot afford not to keep the promises that we and the government have made to the American public. The risks are high. We have only to remember that the Great Depression was as much about hopelessness and people believing that no one cared about them as it was about economics. For those who say Medicare costs too much, I say it pales in comparison to what we spend on guns and war. Others say Medicare should be means-tested, meaning it should be available only to the poor. I respond that making it a welfare program paid for by all but available only to some portion of the population would cause resentment among payers and recipients. Young people are smart. If they see seniors ignored or mistreated, it will foster in them an attitude of selfishness and living for the moment because there is nothing waiting for them in later life. If, by contrast, they see a society that venerates its elders, it will foster in them a desire to help and positive expectations of old age.
"There are those who say that Medicare should be privatized and turned over to the health insurance industry to manage. I say there is no need to do this Medicare has been doing fine for 43 years," Halamandaris explained. "As noted, it is far more efficient than even the best of private health plans. There is no need to run the billions of dollars which represent Medicare premiums through the private health insurance industry, which would only increase costs in the form of higher administrative fees without improving the program."
Halamandaris said there were several things which Congress could do to improve the Medicare program - most of which were suggested by the architects of Medicare, including such luminaries as Congressman Claude D. Pepper, Congressman Wilbur Mills, and former Department of Health and Human Services Secretaries Wilbur Cohen and Arthur Fleming. "Basically, the visionaries concluded that we had over-emphasized the institutional and acute care portions of Medicare and needed to broaden the scope of community-based long-term care services. They also argued for the inclusion of prescription drug coverage, which was accomplished in 2003," said Halamandaris.
