The other day, long-term care insurance gadfly Stephen Moses called me "an advocate of more government financing and an enemy of private LTC financing alternatives." I assume he said this because I believe that reforms such as the CLASS Act, which would create a national long-term care insurance system, would be a far better way to pay for this assistance [...]
In a bit of surprising news, Senate Finance Committee Chair Max Baucus (D-Mont) added some key long-term care amendments to his health reform bill. The provisions, first proposed by senators John Kerry (D-Mass), Maria Cantwell (D-WA), and Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) would all make home and community based care more accessible under Medicaid. Currently, Medicaid is only required to provide long-term [...]
I am disappointed, but not surprised, that Congress' latest health reform effort does almost nothing to repair our tattered long-term care system. The massive health reform bill proposed today by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont) touches nearly every part of the health system: Medicare, Medicaid, private insurance, hospitals, doctors, you name it. Except for one critical element. The proposal all [...]
I moderated two interesting panels today at a long-term care conference sponsored by Genworth, the big insurance company. The first panel included author and family caregiving expert Virginia Morris, National Family Caregivers Association president Suzanne Mintz, and Ancil Alexander, a home health aide who visits clients in the South Bronx. Virginia talked about the desperate need caregivers have for information, Suzanne discussed the [...]
I got back last night from two days in St. Paul, Minn, where I worked with a few dozen deeply commited people who are looking for concrete solutions to the challenges of long-term care. The program was sponsored by the Citizen's League, and it brought together nursing home executives, retired physicans, lobbyists, state officials, advocates for the elderly and the disabled, care [...]
I'm off to St. Paul to particpate in a two-day workshop on long-term care sponsored by the Minnnesota Citizens League, a non-profit dedicated to finding common ground on important policy issues among business, government, community organizations, and individuals. The progam, entitled Creating Incentives for Personal Responsibility in Long-Term Care, has exactly the right goal: Finding community solutions to the challenges of caring for [...]
A new poll suggests the public would like to see long-term care reform included in any congressional remake of the health system. While many respondents were concerned about their ability to pay for care, their biggest interest was in better coverage for home and community supports that could keep them out of nursing homes. The survey, done by Lake Research Partners for [...]
For those interested in long-term care, the House Democrats' consensus health reform bill is pretty disappointing. Unlike the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee version, it includes no proposal for national long-term care insurance. And it largely ignores efforts to expand access to home care for those on Medicaid, who now often can only get care in nursing facilities, or to better coordinate care [...]
The Obama Administration has given a boost to Senator Ted Kennedy's national long-term care insurance program, the CLASS Act. In a July 6 letter to Kennedy, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sibelius said President Obama believes "it is appropriate to include the CLASS Act as part of health reform." Obama co-sponsored the bill when he was in the Senate, but [...]
Supporters of Senator Ted Kennedy's CLASS Act, which would create a national long-term care insurance program, are bragging that the plan would produce $59 billion for the government over the next 10 years, money they say could help pay for health reform. As much as I like the ideas behind the CLASS Act, this claim is both misleading and counterproductive. It [...]