The Smoke and Mirrors of Wellness Care Reform for the Elderly

I am deeply concerned that the American public, in particular our nation’s elders, will be relying on our government to give extended term care services they’ll in no way see. They’ll only see the “smoke and mirrors” of Well being Care Reform.

Our nation’s seniors are the most vulnerable segment of the U.S. population vulnerable both overall health sensible and financially. They’re silently discovering the savings they thought would be enough is not sufficient. They’re silently fearful of operating out of income with no one particular to care for them as they turn into extra frail. The silence is about to come to be deafening.

Regrettably, when Well being Care Reform proudly announced New Lengthy Term Care Solutions, it discouraged many American’s from purchasing Lengthy Term Care Insurance coverage.

The New York Times reported on ‘Options Expand for Reasonably priced Lengthy-Term Care’ THE NEW OLD AGE. The Related Press announced ‘New Health Care Law Has Advantages for Seniors’. Point becoming, the casual reader was relieved to hear their government will “take care of them” when they have to have extended term care services. We now know that is not about to come about.

Luckily our representatives in Washington found that Health Care Reforms answer to the trouble of Long Term Care, “CLASS”, (Community Living Help Solutions and Supports Act) legislation would have been fiscally unsound. $70 billion in premiums that was expected to be raised for the new “long term care” system would have been counted as “deficit reduction”. The extended term care advantages it was intended to finance had been assumed not to materialize in the first ten years. On the other hand, that cash was not accounted for anyplace in the legislation.

The new legislation proposed to “trim” $463 billion from Medicare. However Medicare is at the moment getting difficulty balancing its books these days. Yet, why does the wellness care bill tell us Medicare can operate much more cheaply going forward without the accompanying reforms?

Our national media gave huge fanfare to the CLASS ACT when it passed. Regrettably the media has provided the CLASS ACT’s demise little attention. Now what?

Projections show that the federal deficit is anticipated to exceed $700 billion annually over the subsequent decade. This primarily will double the national and $900 billion represents interest on preceding debt. Would the CFO of any big corporation in the United States permit the business he worked for to finish up in this variety of economic position? Totally not.

Our officials in Congress have been elected to safeguard the very best interests of the American folks. “Robbing Peter to spend Paul”, and after once more printing far more currency, has come to be our government’s mantra for the future. However the magnitude of the mismanagement of America’s purse strings has now reached an unconscionable state.

The United States of America can’t continue to mismanage its economic future. Future Congresses will have to provide a multitude of future reforms and, regrettably, history tells us THAT will never occur. Proposals for financing overall health reform were based on far more “smoke and mirrors”. The “Cadillac” tax is scheduled to commence in 2018.

The wellness care legislation that has been forced on every and just about every one of us is identified to be fiscally unsound. Exactly where do we go from here? It is as well quick to point the finger at the President and his administration. Yet Congress owns the duty of passing Wellness Care Legislation. And THAT is the dilemma.

The 535 voting members of Congress shared the responsibility equally. If a single clear thinking, intelligent, honorable Congressman had the whole duty for Wellness Care Reform, he or she would not have forced a fiscally unsound Health Care Reform Bill down our throats.

Now let’s once more evaluate how Health Care Reform will operate against our senior citizens.

A most recent government report identified that in 2000 there have been 1.eight million obtainable nursing property beds. As the year 2010 came to a close, there had been 1.7 million nursing house beds a net 5 % reduction in available beds. And, there are no new nursing properties being built.

Today there’s much less than 1.5 million Americans confined to nursing homes. Reportedly ten percent of these nursing properties are operating beneath bankruptcy protection. It’s properly recognized that most of these facilities are understaffed and numerous do not have competent enable.

Next, let’s look at that the Alzheimer’s Association tells us the likelihood of establishing Alzheimer’s immediately after age 85 is 50 percent. By 2030, they inform us that the number of people age 65 and older with Alzheimer’s illness is estimated to attain 7.7 million, a 50 % enhance from the 5.two million age 65 and older at the moment affected.

train the trainer course need to ask is “if we cannot take adequate care of 1.5 million persons right now, how can we possibly take care of 7.7 million individuals in 2030?” We can’t. More merely place, when you or your spouse or your parent has Alzheimer’s, there is no location for them to go. Not to be cruel, but if you ever think for a moment about taking in an aged parent with Alzheimer’s into your dwelling, please feel again. Ask any caregiver who’s been via it. It is Guaranteed to destroy any families’ peace of thoughts and harmony.

Why are not our political leaders actively operating on solutions? Where’s the outcry? Regrettably our political leaders only align themselves with solvable problems.

America’s seniors became extra hopeful reading that Wellness Reform will assistance them with added Extended Term Care solutions. And we now know THAT is not going to occur. There are no plans in place to assistance our nation’s seniors believe they’ll receive the comfort and dignity of sufficient extended term care solutions. What’s worse is the silence shared by all our political leaders. The silence is now deafening.


Posted

in

by

Tags:

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *