Report: Medicare Drug Plan Could Waste $80 Billion a Year

Just as the Department of Health and Human Services reports that more than 25 million people have signed up for the Medicare prescription drug plan, a report from the Institute for America's Future alleges that provisions of the plan “inserted at the request of pharmaceutical and HMO interests will cost taxpayers and seniors more than $80 billion a year.”

In a press release, Institute for America's Future co-director Roger Hickey stated, "In a sellout to the drug companies, Congress prohibited Medicare from negotiating a better price for seniors. Then it threw in billions of subsides to HMOs, adding another layer of confusion, bureaucracy and costs to the program. America's most vulnerable—seniors in need of prescription drugs—will pay the cost of this corruption."

The report, The Excess Cost of the Medicare Drug Benefit (.pdf), places blame for the potential waste on a Bush administration decision to provide drug coverage through private providers and to prohibit—at the request of the pharmaceutical industry –Medicare from using its leverage as a bulk buyer to negotiate lower prices.

The Institute for America's Future (IAF) labels itself as “a center of non-partisan research and education.”

Also See:
Profile of the Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit
Extra Help for Medicare’s Prescription Drug Plan
Bush Touts Medicare Prescription Drug Plan