Hatch on Medicare Advantage Annoucement

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Ranking Member of the Senate Finance Committee, issued the following statement today after the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) proposed cuts to the Medicare Advantage (MA) program:

“These Medicare Advantage cuts are misguided, threaten a successful program for seniors, and must be overturned.  Medicare Advantage is extremely popular for a reason – run through the private market, seniors gain access to high-quality and coordinated care with additional benefits that they otherwise wouldn’t get.  Regrettably, this administration continues to undermine this critical program.”

The MA program, which provides coverage for almost 15 million seniors, allows beneficiaries to gain access through a private insurance plan to not only traditional Medicare in-patient and out-patient care, but additional benefits like vision care and better overall care coordination.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) cut $716 billion out of the Medicare program to fund new entitlement spending -- $308 billion of those cuts come from the MA program. Today, CMS released its MA 2015 rate notice to further cut this popular health care program. Such cuts could lead to higher premiums, loss of benefits and fewer choices for seniors enrolled in MA plans.

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