States Asked to Cover Drugs Excluded from Medicare

[HuckleB]

States Asked to Cover Drugs Excluded from Medicare

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/27/AR2005062700423.html

"When the federal government's new prescription drug benefit kicks in next year, it will not cover a category of drugs commonly used to treat anxiety, insomnia and seizures.

That means those disabled and elderly people on Medicare who take Xanax, Valium, Ativan and other types of the drug benzodiazepine will have to look elsewhere for coverage or switch to a different medication.

Finding other alternatives may not be easy for the 1.7 million low-income, elderly people who take the drug and will be automatically enrolled in the new prescription drug plan. They will depend on the states to continue paying for their benzodiazepines -- called "benzos" -- on Jan. 1, but with no guarantee of coverage.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services recently urged state Medicaid directors to provide coverage of the drugs for the 6.3 million people who are eligible for prescription aid under both Medicare and Medicaid.

..."



Health care providers should be more careful than they typically are in prescribing benzos to the elderly population. Still, these are very useful -- and cheap -- in many situations, and this simply makes no sense.

[aquart]

1. What a brilliantly thought out piece of legislation.

Every single person who voted for it should do time for malfeasance.

The starved STATES should handle it? When BushCo is finished, there will be no federal infrastucture that isn't related to killing, detention, and torture. Everything else will be gone.

[Kindigger]

2. You know what they called them on the news?

"Lifestyle drugs" :wtf:

[Algomas]

9. Well said, Aquart...

This is government by the Sopranos. When they shut down the internet it will be the end of democracy. This is a photo of a statue in Tucson that commemorates the Freedom Fighters in the Warsaw Ghetto. I offer it in tribute to rock throwers everywhere up against "full spectrum dominance"

[sweetheart]

3. The government wants more people to smoke cannabis

That is why their doing all this stupid shit. Cannabis is great
for insomnia and stuff.... and hey, it is easily grown in the back
garden... or imported from canada.

:-) Bush is a weed head... and he passes laws to push people on to
cheaper home-grown drugs, rather than those big-pharma jobbies.

It makes perfect sense. 140 million people smoke grass worldwide, and
they are not covered by perscription benefit because they can use the
old back garden.

[legally blonde]

4. how much you want to bet

that this prescription plan covers Viagra?

[Sugarbleus]

5. I got my "letter" from Medicare stating that Medicaid will no longer

pay for my prescriptions at all. I am being forced into the Medicare deal where I'll have to pay a "small copay" for drugs.

The only reason I got Medi-Medi was BECAUSE I am VERY low income.

Luckily I don't have to use extremely expensive meds YET. If I ever wished to save any bucks for my burial, this killed it...along with the increase in rents for section 8 users. We are pretty much pancaked now.

Wow! What a wonderful, hopeful life we are leading here in the "Greatest Country in the World". :sarcasm:

[mom cat]

6. Dimson doesn't have to worry about paying for his Viagra!

[Sugarbleus]

7. Honestly! Doesn't it just frost you over to know they can

get away with that crap!!??

They take OUR taxes and use it to live the life of Riley while kicking us to the curb. MoFOs!!!

[mom cat]

8. You got that one right. The new Medicaid medication cutbacks are

going to hurt a lot of people, none of them will be well-to-do.