Poor not buying new drug benefit yet

Posted 12/8/2005 4:23 AM

Poor not buying new drug benefit yet

WASHINGTON (AP) — The poor seem to need more convincing that they'd be helped by the new Medicare prescription drug benefit that begins next month.

The Social Security Administration says it has approved just 661,000 applications for a subsidy that makes the new drug benefit much more affordable for low-income senior citizens and the disabled.

That's just a fraction of the 7 million people who are believed eligible for the subsidy.

Social Security says about 1 million applications remain under review, and new applications are coming in at the rate of 100,000 a week.

So far, rejections outnumber approvals by about 3-to-1.
(snip/...)

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-12-08-medicare-poor_x.htm

Was not the whole point of the Bush Boondoggle Prescription Benefit...just that? A benefit?

Goes to show you why healines and bylines are as useless as Kyle Orton's passing when it comes to today's so called reporting.

Bullsh*t! Try "finding someone in authority who knows what the F is going on". I am disabled. I received my first informational letter approximately six months ago. At that time, I started trying to figure this thing out. First I'll say that the questions I've been seeking answers to are questions that anyone going through this would need answered before continuing.

I've repeatedly called Social Security. They refer me to my state Medicare office. I've called repeatedly only to get a recorded message "this mailbox is out of order". I repeated my call to SS, telling them the message I continued to receive at the Medicare number. They repeated, "call your state Medicare office". What a waste of my time, and I'm talking hours.

I have researched on the internet extensively. I still had the same questions. I knew phone calls were futile. I found a group of local volunteers who were supposed to be knowledgeable about the subject. The volunteer called me. I asked my questions. "I don't know the answer to that," said the man. I went off on a * rant, and he said he agreed, and that no one knew the answers to my questions.

Just today I had one of many encounters with one of my doctors. She was also looking for the information for her other patients. She had asked me to help her make the calls to find answers. I was in her office when she called SS to ask "the questions". She finally gave me the phone. I asked the questions. The answers didn't even relate to what I asked. It was like calling Dell tech support, and have some moran begin reading from the top of the help manual.

I said, "did you hear any of the questions I just asked?" The woman paused, and finally admitted she didn't know the answers, and probably no one did. She explained that the program was changing day to day!

I am now an expert on the subject except for the answers no one has....YET. It is being made up as they go along. If I weren't convinced this whole thing is the result of total incompetence, I would say it was designed to get business for the pharmaceutical companies in the form of increased dispensation of psychotropic drugs.



:grr: :grr:

and submit it to DU - for the front page. Folks should read this... becoming an expert on questions - and on the many ways folks are given the runaround is disturbing. Not surprising, but disturbing. Most of us who are not directly involved get the sense that this is a very murky process (and they had more than a year to work out details in preparation for rolling the program out) - but to read a clear first person account and to pass that on to others who may be experiencing the same thing (but thinking that perhaps it is *their* problem (some, for example, might be prone to take her lack of ability to make sense of it as perhaps a sign of declining clarity.

I too am disabled (worker's comp pays some of my prescriptions) with no other insurance other than Medicare. Trying to get answers to questions is impossible and in the end I think if I were to enroll in the program it would, for the moment at least, be detrimental to my financial picture. That isn't to say that I won't need more prescriptions in the future but of course if I don't sign up RIGHT NOW I'll pay a "penalty" later. :eyes: Why the "penalty"? :shrug:

I've yet to find anyone who can answer all of my questions either, so don't feel like you're alone in this. I think a majority of Seniors and Disabled are in the same exact boat as us. This was one suck-ass program to begin with, another bush failure!

Sounds like about 3/4 CAN'T buy to me! (And they might end up being the lucky ones if this turns out as well as the rest of *'s crap!)

How long, o Lord?