[lit-ideas] Re: The Prescription Aid Scheme Charade
- From: Eric Yost <eyost1132@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 17:05:19 -0500
Explanation: I'm really annoyed about the new US
Prescription Thing: some anti-convulsants covered by
no plan, barbiturates and benzodiazepines excluded...
one epileptic who couldn't get his medication has
died, there may be others. Implementing a
prescription aid scheme is not rocket science, we do
it here easily.
_________
This from Slate
http://www.slate.com/id/2134456/fr/rss/
[extract]
Drug Addled
Why Bush's prescription plan is such a fiasco.
By Jacob Weisberg
President Bush thought that millions would welcome
his intervention. But the effort has not gone as
planned. Costs are spiraling out of control, and
many of the people we wanted to help are
protesting that the situation is worse than ever.
Three years later, the entire poorly conceived
enterprise is in jeopardy.
I refer, of course, to the administration's
program to subsidize the cost of prescription
drugs for the elderly. This plan, which went into
effect on Jan. 1, offers so many baffling options
that only 1 million of 21 million eligible
Medicare beneficiaries have signed up for it on
their own. Many of these early adopters, along
with millions of impoverished Medicaid recipients
transferred into the new system automatically,
have been unable to obtain their prescriptions at
the promised discounted price. The specter of
citizens going without needed medications has
provoked action by several governors, some of whom
have invoked emergency powers to pay for drugs.
Meanwhile, the estimated cost of this plan that no
one likes has already more than doubled and is now
projected at more than $1 trillion over the next
decade.
------------------------------------------------------------------
To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
Other related posts: