Romney-Allen Health Agenda Would Increase Costs on Seniors Now

9/17/2012

Richmond, VA - A study reported in today's Washington Post blows a hole in a common refrain of both Mitt Romney and former Senator George Allen's campaigns: "We will not increase health care costs on people who are currently 55 or older."


 
As the study states, Romney and Allen's shared commitment to repeal the Affordable Care Act would give back $716 billion in Medicare cost savings that lower premiums on current beneficiaries and would eliminate prescription drug benefit reforms that save seniors as much as $643 per year. As the Post put it, "Repealing the health law would mean higher Medicare premiums, the Kaiser Family Foundation found in a recent analysis. Wellness visits and prescription drugs also would cost more."

 

The study goes on to conclude that the damage the Romney-Allen plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act would do to seniors pales in comparison to their shared desire to turn Medicaid from a guaranteed benefit into a block grant, because the rising cost of care would far outpace the anticipated increase in the grant seniors would receive, leaving them to pay the difference out of pocket. 

 

Virginia seniors simply can't afford to risk their care and their economic futures on a Republican ticket whose agenda will increase their health care costs, all the while protecting (or even expanding) taxpayer handouts to billionaires and oil companies.

 

To read the full Post article on the dangerous Romney-Allen health care agenda for seniors click here.