The Brady Brief - Protecting Medicare

Dear Friend,

Over the last 47 years, Medicare has succeeded in providing health care security for America’s seniors. Today, Medicare provides comprehensive health care coverage to 48 million Americans, including: 40 million seniors; and 8 million people under age 65 with disabilities. Since its enactment, Democrats have been committed to protecting and expanding Medicare, and most recently, President Obama's Affordable Care Act has improved Medicare coverage for millions of seniors throughout this country.

The Affordable Care Act added eight additional years to Medicare’s solvency and contained numerous provisions to improve and expand on the program. The following are just some of the new benefits seniors will receive thanks to the Affordable Care Act:

• Reduced prescription drug costs for more than 5.5 million seniors by closing the Medicare Part D ‘donut hole’ coverage gap
• Free Medicare coverage of key preventive services, such as mammograms and colonoscopies
• New tools to crack down on fraud in Medicare, recovering  more than $4.1 billion in fraudulent Medicare payments on behalf of taxpayers
• New protections from abuse for nursing home residents

Some have argued that the only way to keep a program for seniors’ health care going into the future is to repeal the Affordable Care Act, end Medicare as we know it, and replace it with a system where seniors get a voucher to go out and buy private insurance, where they will have reduced benefits and higher costs. I reject that view, and remain committed to preserving and strengthening Medicare for future generations.

Sincerely,

Robert Brady
Member of Congress