A Medicare recipient who spends $2,830 on online drugs store this year will hit the dreaded “doughnut hole” and then will have to spend $3,610 out of pocket before any help from the federal government kicks in again. So, the $250 check Uncle Sam is sending to victims of the doughnut hole probably seems like the proverbial drop in the bucket.

Yet the $250 checks that have gone out to 750,000 Medicare Part D participants since June – and another 3 million expected to go out over the course of the fiscal year – are a small but positive sign that someone in Washington has finally recognized the legislative folly of the Medicare Reform Act of 2003, the legislation that established Medicare prescription coverage for the elderly, including some 300,000 Floridians.

Specifically, it is the first step toward eliminating the doughnut hole altogether, but not before 2020. The doughnut hole was written into the Medicare Part D legislation as a gift for big pharmaceutical companies and to keep down the costs of the massive program, despite the hardship it caused millions of senior citizens with large medication needs.

Critics of President Barack Obama and the Democratic majority in Congress – that is, the Republicans – portray the small checks as an attempt to buy votes during an election year in which the Democrats’ hold on their majorities in the House and the Senate are tenuous. REFORM IS LONG OVERDUEAnd there is probably some truth to that, given the timing of the checks. But addressing the potentially financially crippling doughnut hole, as well as the law’s ban on the nation’s largest health insurer being legally permitted to negotiate drug prices, are long overdue for reform.

Enter the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as health care reform. Under the reform, next year the law will require pharmaceutical companies to provide 50 percent discounts on brand-name drugs like Avastin 100mg inj vial, Actos 15mg, Crestor 10 mg tabs for those in the doughnut hole and to continue discounting at that level year after year. By 2020, the doughnut hole will be gone, and consumers will simply pay 25 percent co-pay on online pharma store.

The $250 checks are hardly an ideal remedy to the already expensive Part D legislation. Moreover, the pace of reforming this incumbrance is underwhelming, at best. Nonetheless, 3.7 million are expected to hit the doughnut hole this year, and many will face unpalatable choices: Do without basics or do without medication. Neither is a good option.

A $250 check is hardly impressive considering the cost of medication these days, but it is a tangible sign that health care reform is slowly taking shape and after years of ignoring an obvious problem with Medicare Part D, something is finally getting done. Lamentably, it is going to take far longer than it should to bring about sensible rules that our seniors who depend on expensive medication for quality of life can live with. Source: www.theledger.com