Retirement Watch Lighthouse Logo

Medicare Advantage and Obamacare

Last update on: Feb 02 2017

If you’re in a Medicare Advantage plan (about 25% of Medicare beneficiaries are), you’ve already seen the negative effects the Affordable Care Act is having. But there is a lot more to come. About $156 billion over 10 years is expected to be shifted from Medicare Advantage plans to help fund the increased coverage and subsidies for others. Many of the cuts to Medicare Advantage were delayed until after the 2012 election, and it looks like some others will be delayed until after the 2014 elections. But make no mistake, they are coming. One of the intents of the law is to shrink or eliminate these plans. You can read more about it here.

Obamacare contains speculative changes in traditional Medicare to address these deficiencies, but the plain fact is that the only proven, existing — if not uniformly perfect — approach to coordinated care is Medicare Advantage.

Seniors in 75 percent of Medicare Advantage will get to “keep their plan” (at least this year). However, keeping their plans might not mean keeping their doctors, keeping their affordable premium or keeping their benefits.

The insurance companies that continue to offer their plans in 2014 and beyond have to find ways to absorb the sharp payment reductions and have a limited number of mechanisms to do so.

The options: raise premiums, reduce the optional benefits, pull out of certain counties, increase cost-sharing, or limit physician and hospital networks. This is a menu of potential to harm seniors’ finances and health care choices.

bob-carlson-signature

Retirement-Watch-Sitewide-Promo

Log In

Forgot Password

Search