Jul 14,
2018
Seniors who use a Medicare Cost plan are in
for a rude awakening at the end of the year. That's what U.S. Rep. Tim Walz,
D-1st District, believes.
Walz and U.S. Rep. Collin Peterson,
D-Minnesota, introduced legislation Wednesday to extend a 2019 deadline to
switch Medicare Cost plan beneficiaries to Medicare Advantage plans by two
years.
"Many of your readers are going to see
this for the first time and have no idea that they are going to lose their
plan," Walz said.
The issue lies in the more than 350,000 Minnesotans
who have Medicare Cost plans, a type of Medicare insurance offered by private
companies. Residents will only have about 30 days at the end of the year to
find a new health insurance plan.
Walz said his office expects to be inundated
with calls from concerned seniors who won't have enough time to understand why
they need to switch or navigate all insurance options. One agent, Carolyn Mager
of St. Peter, shared her thoughts with Walz's staff as part of a public pitch
to extend the deadline.
"Due to the brief Medicare open
enrollment window, I’m concerned that current Medicare Cost members won’t have
sufficient time to research and understand the options available to replace
their Cost plan," Mager said in a statement as part of a Walz press release
on the bill. "Even more so, I am concerned about the potential loss of
network and plan flexibility that Medicare Cost plans currently provide. I
cringe to think I may have to tell a client that only one of their three
doctors are now in-network with their new plan."
To that end, Walz is mounting an effort to
either push the switch back or make seniors across the state aware of the
coming insurance changes.
Last year, the Trump administration created
the deadline to end most Medicare Cost plans across the U.S. The changes only
affect counties where two or more Medicare Advantage plans — a similar type of
Medicare insurance offered by private companies — are available to buy. The
change affects about 600,000 seniors, more than half of whom are Minnesotans.
Federal officials have tried to transition
away from Cost plans for years; the deadline to do so has been pushed back in
the past. Despite the congressional turmoil over everything from the 2018 Farm
Bill to tariffs and President Trump, Walz is confident he can get some
Republican support for his bill.
If nothing else, he hopes the attention will
make the Trump administration push the deadline back on its own.
"Basically, this is going to be a cliff
that people fall over," he said.
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