NAACP Helps Seniors with New Medicare Plan

Crisis, The, Jul/Aug 2006 by Danois, Ericka Blount

The new Medicare Part D plan is complicated and has even those in the medical field baffled. Just think how seniors felt when given the May 15 deadline to enroll in Medicare Part D - which allows them to be eligible for prescription drug coverage without incurring penalties.

The NAACP, private drug companies and advocate groups for seniors worked to provide enrollment training to help seniors understand the complicated benefit plans and to have them enroll before the deadline.

The benefit is delivered entirely by private insurers and subsidized by the government. The result is that most states have 40 or more drug plans - and seniors complain that the process is confusing.

"Our goal is to work to get people educated about this benefit, but also to work politically to try to get the deadline pushed back and the penalty waived," says Myisha Patterson, national health coordinator in the NAACP Health Advocacy Department, which worked to get the word out to seniors around the country.

The NAACP has worked closely with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to provide Medicare enrollment training and education to local units and at each of the seven NAACP regional conferences. The organization coordinated public service announcements with Bill Cosby and Danny Glover and sponsored more than 50 Medicare education and enrollment events in communities throughout the nation. The events assisted African American Medicare beneficiaries with a special emphasis on those with limited incomes.

"I am delighted that the NAACP and Pfizer have taken a leadership role in spreading this message, and I am very pleased to stand with them to inform my fellow senior citizens, especially in the African American community," said Ruby Dee, the renowned actress and activist in a statement. "The opportunity is there and it is time to take advantage of it."

African American seniors are particularly vulnerable to missing out on the benefit of the plans. Minorities in general are less likely to be insured and less likely to have prescription drug coverage. In addition, one of the primary vehicles in getting signed up for the benefits was by logging on to the Internet. Only 11 percent of African Americans age 65 and older use the Internet compared with 22 percent of non-Hispanic Whites and 21 percent of English-speaking Hispanics. Though there were paper applications at Social security offices around the country, many disabled seniors were unable to get to these locations.

"We were able to support some enrollment events that the NAACP was doing at their conferences," says Wendy Zenker, director of the Access to Benefits Coalition at the National Council on Aging. "We put mobile vans and educators and wireless technology out in 32 communities around the country, putting counselors on site and supporting the local community."

Texas, New York, Georgia, Florida, Virginia, Maryland, California, North Carolina, Illinois and Pennsylvania are the states that have the highest number of African Americans who are eligible for Medicare Part D, but are not enrolled.

Many seniors have complained of expensive co-payments, coverage gaps and a confusing process, among other downfalls of the program.

According to the Medicare website, "All plans offer coverage until you hit a limit of $2,250 in total drug costs. And all plans offer coverage when your outof-pocket costs exceed $3,600. Some plans offer coverage during the gap between $2,250 in total costs and $3,600 in out-of-pocket costs."

The penalty is another source of contention for seniors who did not sign up before May 15, 2006. The penalty is 1 percent of the cost of their premium for each month that they could have enrolled and is added to the cost of their prescription drug plan once they enroll. The penalty remains as long as they continue to be in the program. The NAACP is supporting legislation pending in Congress to abolish the penalty. The next open enrollment period is not until November.

"It's hard to explain to anyone in the medical field, and when you start talking to people who don't even understand health benefits, it is foreign to them," says Patterson. "There are a number of different plans depending on what area you're in. Some plans offer coverage during the coverage gap, some plans don't have a deductible, it just depends. There are so many options and they are so complex and confusing."

- Ericka Blount Danois