Thank you Biden/Harris.

'Inflation Reduction Act sent seniors' health care costs surging'

<https://www.thecentersquare.com/national/article_b0b100ea-957c-11ef-ad2c-eba8b2be1119.html>

'Medicare premiums and senior citizens' prescription drug costs have
surged since passage of the $891 billion Inflation Reduction Act of
2022, according to data compiled by an advocate for seniors on the
federal health care program.

The legislation promised financial relief for millions of people with
Medicare by expanding benefits, lowering drug costs, and strengthening
Medicare for future seniors. Medicare Is for Seniors' "Misery Index," as
the report is known, says prescription drug costs instead have risen
nationally by 31%, leaving seniors with new expenses and fewer options.
Those costs will rise again under the new Plan B premiums.

With less than a week until the 2024 presidential election, these higher
Medicare monthly drug premiums will be in 45 of 50 states, including
those considered battleground states. More than 67 million Americans
rely on Medicare for their health care.

As previously reported by The Center Square, the new average plan bid
for a standard Part D coverage will increase by 179% for 2025, partly
due to an underestimation of federal attributions to the Part D changes.
The Biden administration's Medicare prescription drug premiums could
cost taxpayers more than $21 billion over three years.

The national monthly average cost rose from $47.69 in 2022 to $62.34 in
2025, a 31% increase that will cost seniors an additional $176 annually
per individual, according to Mark Merritt, the founder of Medicare Is
for Seniors' "Misery Index."

Merritt told The Center Square that seniors end up paying the tab with
higher monthly Medicare premiums. He said that the Inflation Reduction
Act makes Medicare Drug Plans offer costly new benefits and siphons
funds from Medicare into the federal treasury for its funding, most
notably its electric car and green energy subsidies.

In an op-ed for the Atlanta Journal Consitution, Merritt wrote that
"rates for Medicare Prescription Drug Plans have risen four times more
than the national rate of inflation since the IRA was enacted. In some
battlegrounds, it's risen eight or nine times higher."

Georgia seniors will have a monthly premium increase of 59% in 2025,
totaling $73.42 compared to $46.05 in 2022. North Carolina seniors will
have a 39% increase in monthly premiums, rising from $46.67 in 2022 to
$65 in 2025, while Pennsylvania seniors get a 35% monthly increase to
$71.53 a month in 2025 from $52.86 in 2022, according to the index.

Merritt reiterated that Medicare and prescription drug savings are used
to finance other parts of the legislation that have nothing to do with
Medicare.

The Inflation Reduction Act added red tape and government mandates to
Medicare Part D, which increased seniors' drug costs, he said.

"Before the IRA overhauled Part D, costs for Medicare drug benefits had
stayed flat for the previous 18 years," Merritt said.

"So there's an IRA double whammy; it's that the law's spending
contributed to higher general inflation of 7% since 2022," said Merritt,
but caused "Medicare inflation" to spike 31% during those same two
years.

According to KFF, an independent source for health policy research,
polling, and news, insurers are increasing premiums for their
stand-alone drug plan offerings, but not "across the board." They also
are reducing standalone prescription drug plan offerings, from 709 plans
in 2024 to 524 plans nationwide in 2025.

Wisconsin is one of the few states with a decline in monthly premium
costs, according to the misery index, when rates decrease 5%, $50.10 in
2022 to $47.83 in 2025.

New York seniors will have the highest increase in Medicare PDP plans
with a rate of $52.46 in 2022, increasing to $97.13 in 2025.

California will increase 69%, with the coverage increasing from $55.82
monthly in 2022 to $94.31 in 2025, making it the second-largest increase
on Merrit's Misery Index.

Nevada seniors will have the third-highest increase in prescription drug
costs, when premiums increase from $44.24 in 2022 to $72.52 in 2025.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services website says the
legislation offers provisions of financial relief for those with
Medicare by lowering some drug costs, keeping prescription drug premiums
stable, and improving the strength of the Medicare program.

The benefits include a cap of $35 for a month supply of insulin, access
to recommended adult vaccines without cost-sharing, a yearly cap of
$2,000 in 2025 on out-of-pocket prescription drug costs, and the
expansion of the low-income subsidy program'