Quote:

---

About 20 states, including California, Illinois, Ohio, Pennsylvania and all of New England, have announced that they will help low-income people by paying drug claims that should have been paid by the federal Medicare program. ( http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/16/politics/16drug.html?pagewanted=prin
t&_r=1&)]

---

Quote:

---

With tens of thousands of people unable to get medicines promised by Medicare, the Bush administration has told insurers that they must provide a 30-day supply of any drug that a beneficiary was previously taking, and it said that poor people must not be charged more than $5 for a covered drug.

---

Quote:

---

Eight years ago, the federal government rolled out Medicare Part D, a prescription drug benefit. For the first time ever, Medicare was launching a benefit administered exclusively through private health insurance plans. The benefit was not popular: In the spring of 2005, when enrollment efforts ramped up, polls showed Medicare Part D to be less popular than the Affordable Care Act. Fewer Americans felt they understood how it worked, too...

Neither was especially popular in the months prior to their launch. Part D was even less liked: 21 percent of the public had a favorable opinion of the program in April 2005 compared to 35 percent in April 2013 for the Affordable Care Act. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/06/21/part-d-was-
less-popular-than-obamacare-when-it-launched/]

---

Quote:

---

A new poll sponsored by a health care group shows that 90% of seniors are satisfied with the program known as Medicare Part D, and approval has constantly risen since the plan came on line in 2006.

"Nearly seven years later, 9 in 10 Medicare beneficiaries have prescription drug coverage," says the poll. "Satisfaction among those with Medicare Part D has grown 12 points from 78% to 90%. Most are very satisfied with their coverage and say their plan offers excellent value, reasonable costs, and convenience." http://www.usatoday.com/story/onpolitics/2012/10/03/poll-medicare-pres
cription-drug-program-popular/1609995/]

---

Quote:

---

- Polls ahead of the Part D launch showed that more people felt unfavorably about it than liked it.
- There were big questions about whether enough insurers would participate.
- Everyone was worried that the IT systems and plan reviews wouldn't be ready on time.
- Pricing was a big worry.
- States were grumbling about the regulatory and cost burdens they would face under the part D program.
- The publicity campaign was daunting and consumers were confused by the options available to them.

RWJF concludes: "Past efforts to design and launch a large national health coverage program suggest that the experience will be far from perfect, at least at the outset. However, the Medicare Part D experience teaches us that, when things went awry, federal and state officials were often able to identify problems and work with stakeholders to develop policy and operational solutions, so that consumers could obtain the promised benefits." http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2013/06/20/paper-compares-obama-law-with
-medicare-part-d-mass/]

---

Quote:

---

Here's a thought exercise on this summer morning: Imagine that after the controversial Medicare prescription-drug legislation was passed into law in 2003, Democrats did everything they could to thwart one of George W. Bush's top domestic achievements. They launched Senate filibusters to block essential HHS appointees from administering the law; they warned the sports and entertainment industries from participating in any public service announcements to help seniors understand how the law works; and, after taking control of the House of Representatives in 2007, they used the power of the purse to prohibit any more federal funds from being used to implement the law. As it turns out, none of that happened. http://firstread.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/07/09/19373088-first-thoughts-
welcome-to-the-perpetual-campaign?lite

---