MEDICARE: Tackling some myths

Being recently eligible and enrolled in Medicare, I’m finding all this talk about the panacea of “Medicare for all” incredibly misleading. It is being presented as “free” and “without the denials and paperwork” of private insurance. The facts are proving otherwise.

Our retirement adviser suggested budgeting at least $15,000 per year for medical costs. The Medicare premiums, Part F & D supplemental plans and deductibles, alone reach about $10,000. Yes, that is a bargain compared to buying a plan on the private insurance market, but it is not free.

Then there are the “denials.” Certain medications that I took for granted under private insurance for years are denied under Medicare. Just this morning I opened my recent Medicare summary which included a denial for a $721 anesthesia bill for a 15-minute procedure (which would have been ISIS level torture without sedation).

No, Medicare is not financially and paperwork free. If you have private insurance, fight for it and let’s look for ways to help the 8 percent who don’t have insurance.

In addition, what the health care system is reimbursed by Medicare would not continue to sustain the greatest health care system in the world; not to mention the cost would bankrupt our economy (hello Venezuela?). It’s been said over and over again, but the answers to reform lie in the ingenuity of free market reforms: more competition, less regulation and onerous paperwork, and malpractice reforms, not a government takeover of 1/6 of our U.S. economy.

DENISE GRAVES

Hayden Lake