There is no doubt that the most overdue and meaningful improvement needed for Medicare is a comprehensive prescription drug benefit available and affordable to all seniors. But seniors don’t need recycled gimmicks like discount cards that even the General Accounting Office says will only save $3.50 per prescription, or confusing differences between levels of benefits that appear to bribe seniors into joining risky HMOs.

President George W. Bush promised seniors a prescription drug benefit and has said repeatedly a Medicare drug benefit is a top domestic policy goal. But the actual proposals from the Bush administration don’t deliver on that promise. The plan revealed today would likely lead to coercing seniors to join private HMOs—not to a guaranteed drug benefit to help the tens of millions of retired and older Americans who have no drug insurance and cannot afford the out-of-pocket expenses to buy medicine.

In today’s health care environment, to deny seniors access to affordable medicine is to force them into inadequate care. That is as unacceptable. Trickery and broken promises are doubly unacceptable.

Contact: Kathy Roeder (202) 637-5018