Many Still Angry About Medicare Bill A month after President George W. Bush signed into law the most sweeping changes to Medicare since its inception 40 years ago, many senior citizens on Long Island remain angry and frustrated over legislation they see as hurting their access to health-care coverage. The anger has increased, as details of the law emerge, including the plan to provide a prescription drug benefit. In interviews and at public and private meetings, senior citizens have expressed unhappiness with Bush, Congress, and the AARP, the nation's largest organization representing older Americans, which had backed the administration's Medicare legislation. Thursday, more than 100 senior citizens filled a meeting room at Jefferson's Ferry Senior Community in Port Jefferson to express outrage and their concerns about the law, which does not take effect until 2006. "People in the United States have waited more than 30 years for a drug bill," said Albert Ammerman, the former president of Suffolk Community College and a resident of Jefferson's Ferry. "But not this one." At the two-hour meeting, called by Rep. Tim Bishop (D-Southampton), who opposed the legislation, senior citizens said they worried that prescription drug plans provided by their employers would be eliminated once the new Medicare bill kicks in. They wanted to know who would be most likely to profit from the legislation. Arlene Gilligan asked the question that many others said was most pressing: "How do we get this bill repealed?" she said to applause. "We have some experience in this area," Bishop said. He noted that in 1989, after tumultuous protests, Congress repealed a 1988 law that would have imposed a surtax of between $22.50 to $800 on Medicare beneficiaries to help fund catastrophic-illness benefits. "Seniors went crazy," Bishop said. "I think some of that has to happen." Bishop said one part of the new law might be repealed, the part that prohibits importation of prescription drugs from Canada unless they are certified safe by Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson. Bishop handed out petitions that he urged attendees to sign and send to Thompson, who has said he will not certify drugs from Canada as safe. Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford), who supported the Medicare legislation, said in a phone interview last night that he did not believe any part of the bill could be repealed. Opponents, King said, "will not get two-thirds" of the House to support any move for repeal. Even if they did, King said, any such action "would be vetoed by the president." King called the bill a significant step forward. "The average senior citizen on Long Island is going to be better off because of this bill," he said. King said very few seniors have raised the Medicare issue with him. At Jefferson Ferry, many said they would a prescription drug law different from the one Congress passed. "It's not a very good bill," said Barbara Strongin, chairwoman of publicity for Senior Community. "There's lots of confusion over the provisions." Many people, she said, are unsure whether their employer-provided benefits will continue after 2006, because the new law might give companies an incentive to drop their own plan. Others said the bill is a boon to private insurance companies, since it prohibits the government from using its buying power to negotiate lower drug prices. There were complaints about the so-called doughnut, a period where coverage will stop until a beneficiary has spent $3,600 out of pocket. Medicare will then pay 95 percent of the cost of each prescription after that. This story originally came from NewsDay ... Return to the Media Section

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