SENIORS WILL PAY TWICE FOR DRUGS
Seniors with Medicare supplemental insurance will have to pay $600 a year, in addition to their insurance premiums, which run about $1,800 a year, for an increase of 33%.

ALMOST DOUBLES THE COST OF MEDICARE
The current payroll tax for Medicare is 2.9%. To cover the costs of Gore's plan, including drug coverage, the tax on every worker will go up to 4.84%, an increase of 171%.

A worker making $35,000 a year would pay $847 a year instead of $508. (Source: "Financing Medicare's Future," National Academy of Social Insurance, www.nasi.org)

SENIORS FORCED TO JOIN AN HMO
This plan takes the worst features of HMOs that most Americans protest, and forces them on seniors.

This plan creates one drug Health Maintenance Organization (HMO) run by the federal government that would give regional contracts to Pharmaceutical Benefit Managers (PBMs) that would employ the same cost-cutting methods as regular HMOs--restricting choice of drugs and what's covered.(Sources: Center for Regulatory Effectiveness, 9/13/00 and Congressional Budget Office, 5/11/00).

DRUGS WILL BE RESTRICTED
Price controls resulting from the contracts with PBMs will result in the limitation of drugs that are covered. If the most effective, appropriate drug prescribed by their doctor is not covered, seniors may have to take their chances without the drug, or be forced to accept a less effective generic or substitute drug. (Source: The Heritage Foundation, 7/6/99)

ONCE YOU'RE IN, YOU CAN'T GET OUT
Once you enroll, you're in for life, even if you find out that it's costing you more than your current coverage.

INCREASED FEDERAL BUREAUCRACY AND CONTROL OVER MEDICAL CARE
The government agency that controls Medicare is the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA). Known as the IRS of health care, HCFA has been much maligned as an inefficient agency, responsible for wasting millions of dollars. The policies of HCFA are a form of waste, fraud and abuse. (Source: "How Medicare Paperwork Abuses Doctors and Harms Patients," The Heritage Foundation, 5/11/00)

HCFA has already issued more than 111,000 pages of regulations that hospitals and doctors must comply with under Medicare. This is SIX TIMES as large as the tax code. (Source: Multinational Business Services, 11 Dupont Circle NW, Suite 700, Washington DC 20036, or from the Center for Regulatory Effectiveness at www.thecre.com) The Gore plan will expand HCFA's power by enacting more than 182 controls dealing with prescription drugs alone, resulting in thousands of new regulations that can be used to prosecute doctors. (Source: "A High Price Prescription," Multinational Business Services, 9/13/00)

CLAIM DISPUTES WILL TAKE LONGER TO RESOLVE
If you have a dispute about your Medicare claim, HCFA's already overburdened system takes 524 days (more than a year!) to resolve it. (Source: House of Representatives, Ways and Means Committee) The estimated 900 million claims a year for drugs will only delay everyone's reimbursement.

LIFE-SAVING DRUG RESEARCH WILL BE LIMITED
Price controls would severely limit the funds available to pharmaceutical companies for research.

There are currently more than 700 new medicines under development that would help seniors. Some of the new drugs in the pipeline that would be hamstrung are: a vaccine for Alzheimer's disease, a remedy for osteoporosis, and a treatment for macular degeneration, a leading cause of blindness in 1.7 million seniors. (Source: PhRMA, "Drug Companies Are Researching Nearly 700 New Medicines for Diseases of Aging," 2000, www.phrma.org)

EMPLOYERS WILL DROP SENIORS' COVERAGE
Many employers' plans pay for drug coverage for seniors. A leading consulting firm estimates that 50 to 75% will lose their coverage, and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) puts the estimate at 25%. (Sources: "An Analysis of Displacement of Employer-Sponsored Retiree Prescription Drug Coverage," PriceWaterhouseCoopers, LLP, 9/21/99; CBO Testimony before the Senate Committee on Finance, 7/22/99)

YOUR GRANDCHILDREN WILL FOOT THE BILL
The increases in funding for this current expansion of Medicare will last for more than 30 years. The next generation would be subjected to an extra 8.43% surcharge on the current income tax, or a federal sales tax of more than 2% on all goods and services. (Source: National Academy of Social Insurance, www.nasi.org)

The addition of any stand-alone prescription drug benefit to Medicare is a flawed strategy, much like adding a third floor to a building with a crumbling foundation.

The AAPS Proposal for Medicare Reform is based on providing vouchers to seniors who could use the vouchers to pay premiums on a managed care plan, an indemnity plan, or fund a Medical Savings Accounts and pay for the premiums on a catastrophic policy. Or seniors could stay in the current fee-for-service plan, and use their vouchers to pay for whatever services they deem most appropriate, whether physician fees or prescription drugs.