“Double digit cuts in two years. It’s too much, too soon.”
America’s Health Insurance Plans’ Coalition for Medicare Choices (CMC) today released a new television ad highlighting the impact that recently proposed cuts to Medicare Advantage would have on the millions of seniors enrolled in Medicare Advantage. The new TV ad is the latest part of the Coalition’s ongoing advocacy campaign urging the Medicare agency to protect seniors in the program by maintaining current Medicare Advantage payment rates in 2015.
“Fifteen million seniors depend on Medicare Advantage. Last year’s deep rate cuts hit them – hard,” the new ad says. “Now the Medicare agency is proposing even more cuts. Seniors’ costs will grow. Benefits will shrink. Choices will disappear.”
“Double digit cuts in two years. It’s too much, too soon,” the ad says.
On February 21, CMS, the Medicare agency, released the 2015 advance notice, which included proposed changes to Medicare Advantage payments for next year. According to a new report from Oliver Wyman, these changes, if finalized, would result in a 5.9 percent cut to Medicare Advantage payments in 2015. This would result in seniors facing benefit reductions and premium increases of $35-$75 per month, or $420-$900 for the year, according to the report.
Medicare Advantage payments were cut by 4-6 percent last year, which resulted in cost increases and benefit cuts of $30-$70 per month for beneficiaries. If the new changes proposed by CMS are implemented, the program would be hit by a double-digit cut over just a two-year period, according to the latest Oliver Wyman analysis. Cuts of this magnitude could result in a “high degree of disruption in the MA market,” including the “potential for plan exits, reductions in service areas, reduced benefits, provider network changes, and MA plan disenrollment,” the report stated.
Final Medicare Advantage payment rates will be announced on April 7, 2014. Seniors will see the impact of any new payment cuts in late October 2014, when they begin enrolling in their 2015 Medicare Advantage coverage.
A bipartisan group of 40 senators recently sent a letter urging CMS to “maintain payment levels that will allow MA beneficiaries to be protected from disruptive changes in 2015.” A broad array of organizations – representing employers, providers, consumers, and health care stakeholders – have also sent letters urging the agency to keep rates flat to protect seniors from further harm.
The CMC advocacy campaign includes television, digital, print, and display advertising in key markets around the country and in Washington, D.C. and grassroots mobilization of CMC’s 1.5 million Medicare Advantage beneficiaries. To learn more, visit www.MedicareChoices.org, check out the CMC’s new Tumblr page, and follow the coalition on Twitter (@ProtectMyMA) and Facebook.