WASHINGTON — Private Medicare plans often cost beneficiaries more than the traditional government-run Medicare program, Congressional investigators say.
Many private plans advertise extra benefits and low costs. But in a report to be issued Thursday, the Government Accountability Office, an investigative arm of Congress, says that many people in private plans face higher costs for home health care, nursing homes and some hospital stays.
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The report says, “Medicare spends more per beneficiary in Medicare Advantage than it does for beneficiaries in the original Medicare fee-for-service program, at an estimated additional cost to Medicare of $54 billion from 2009 through 2012.”
Bush administration officials and insurance executives say the private plans provide a bargain.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/28/washington/28medicare.html?_r=1&th=&oref=slogin&emc=th&adxnnlx=1204312300-I6Wp%20AJkkHebOXuDWox0eQ&pagewanted=printThis is why we have to be forever vigilant where the Bush Administration is concerned. The privatized plan is shown to be a crock and the Bush people stay on message regardless of the facts..."everthing's great!"
We cannot believe anything this administration says...zero.
