For the following research topic I have conducted an internet search on health policy and I also used The Kaiser Family Foundation Health Policy Topic list. After looking at The Kaiser Family Foundation Policy Topic list I decided to focus my research on Medicare. I will start off with a definition and explanation of Medicare followed by the stakeholders affected by Medicare system.
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Background Information Medicare was established in 1965 and is a social insurance program that provides health and financial security for individuals ages 65 and older and for younger people with permanent disabilities (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010). As history has shown this program has provided seniors with vital health care that more then half of them lacked prior to the establishment of this program.
Currently in the United States almost all seniors have health insurance under Medicare. In 2010 the statistics on Medicare coverage where 47 million people in 2010: 39 million people ages 65 and older and 8 million people with permanent disabilities who are under age 65 (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010). The Medicare “program helps to pay for many important health care services, including hospitalizations, physician services, and prescription drugs” (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010).
Program funding comes from “individuals contribute payroll taxes to Medicare throughout their working lives and generally become eligible for Medicare when they reach age 65, regardless of income or health status” (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010). In March 2010 Medicare was expanded by the health care reform law. This law made provisions that expanded prescription drug and “prevention benefits covered under Medicare and introduces new programs designed to improve the quality and delivery of care to people covered by Medicare” (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010).
This change also “reduces the growth in Medicare payments to health care providers and Medicare Advantage plans, and includes other provisions designed to slow the growth in Medicare spending and strengthen the solvency of the Medicare Hospital Insurance Trust Fund, including the creation of a new Independent Payment Advisory Board” (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010). Stakeholders
The direct current stakeholders in the system are the 47 plus million people, senior and permanently disabled that this program is currently serving. This being said “Comprising an estimated 12 percent of the federal budget and more than one-fifth of total national health expenditures in 2010” (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010), I think that these statistics make not only the seniors and permanently disabled stakeholder but also all United States taxpaying citizens are stakeholders in this program.
Unfortunately for those stakeholders yet to retire Medicare is struggling to keep up with demand and is project to become bankrupt before many of us who have paid money into the system are old enough to retire and use it. “The management of the program has fallen short of expectations because it has not always appropriately balanced or satisfied the needs of beneficiaries, providers, and taxpayers” (Medicare Management, 2010).
If something is not changed to fix this vital program many seniors for generations to come will be forced to live without the most basic of health care. Conclusion Medicare is not simply an issue that concerns only seniors and the disabled. All United States citizens are stakeholders in this program either directly or indirectly. Medicare is an essential program that provides millions of our most deserving citizens the most basic of health insurance benefits and care.
Without this program many seniors and permanently disabled Americans would have no access to health care. The Medicare program provides a vital life saving service and it is our duty to insure that it is able to keep taking care of the generations to come.
