After a government shutdown and months of drama, it appears that President Trump may be about to drop his aggressive opposition to extending soon-to-expire enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies. And by doing so, he may have made it much more likely that 22 million people currently receiving premium tax credits will continue to receive their full subsidies. Preserving the subsidies, [...]
I and others have written endlessly about the importance of supporting family caregivers. They are the backbone of the system of care that supports frail older adults and younger people with disabilities. Often, their assistance is vastly more important than costly medical treatment. But many family members provide this care with little or no training, no guidance about services that [...]
Donald Trump’s return to the White House, coupled with Republican control of the Senate and possibly of the House could result in a far more limited government role in the care of older adults and younger people with disabilities. Most immediately, Trump’s proposed mass deportations will make the current shortage of care workers much worse, increasing the burden on family [...]
Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris says she wants to create a home-based long-term care benefit under Medicare. She’s suggesting an historic change in the health care system for older adults and some younger people with disabilities. But her idea raises important political and policy questions. Harris describes the broad outlines of her plan in a hard-to-find fact sheet here. Oddly, [...]
One of the many lessons we should have learned from the Covid-19 pandemic is the cost to older adults of loneliness and social isolation. While nearly 900,000 older adults died from the virus, tens of thousands were sickened and may have died from the isolation the pandemic caused. But what have we learned from that tragic experience? Whether older adults [...]
President Biden’s 2025 budget proposal, which will double as his presidential campaign platform, includes major proposals aimed at supporting older adults. It would raise taxes to help fund Medicare, increase federal support for Medicaid home-based care,, create a federal family leave program for those caring for older adults as well as children, and toughen regulation and inspections of nursing homes. [...]
In a long-awaited and highly controversial decision, the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has proposed that nursing homes provide at least three hours of staff time daily for every patient or resident. Would it meaningfully improve care at nursing facilities? Not by much. The rule would require facilities to provide enough staff to deliver 33 minutes (.55 [...]
The federal agency that operates Medicare, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), is finally recognizing what families have known for, well, thousands of years: Family members are the bedrock of the system of care for frail older adults and younger people with disabilities. And the agency is taking some important steps to help them. Some proposals will provide [...]
As the Covid-19 public health emergency ends, many older adults who need a post-hospital stay in a skilled nursing facility (SNF) will be in for an unpleasant surprise: Traditional Medicare may not pay. The change, one among dozens that affect older adults, restores rules from before the pandemic. But they are complicated and will shock many patients and their families, [...]
One would have thought that after more than 750,000 Covid-19 related deaths among older adults in the US and more than 200,000 deaths among residents and staffs of long-term care facilities that Congress would act to improve the nation’s long-term care system. One would have been wrong. Except for including about $12 billion in federal funds to temporarily expand Medicaid’s [...]