Seniors

In the last Presidential election, both candidates promised America’s seniors real prescription drug relief. We have not lived up to that promise.

If you or your family members have visited a physician lately and needed medications, you know about the cumbersome cost of prescription drugs. Prescription drugs have enabled our nation's seniors to live longer, healthier, and more fulfilling lives. However, the high cost of prescription drugs presents a disproportionately heavy burden for most seniors, since they lack basic drug coverage.

In fact, seniors without coverage end up spending twice as much on medication as seniors who are covered. That's why House Democrats proposed a solution that would have expanded Medicare to offer a prescription drug benefit that is universally available, affordable, dependable, and voluntary.

Seniors deserve a real Medicare prescription drug benefit that would be available to all seniors at an affordable price. I joined many of my colleagues in offering a plan that kept our commitments to the American people with a serious, sensible, responsible Medicare prescription drug benefit.

Unfortunately in the House, Republicans crafted a bill that only served the interests of the pharmaceutical industry and failed to offer a real Medicare prescription drug benefit for all seniors.

The Republican bill will cover less than a quarter of Medicare beneficiaries estimated drug costs over the next ten years. It fails to offer a guaranteed benefit, and the Republican plan actually lets private insurers determine the prescription drug benefit, rejecting the values of stability and dependability important to seniors on fixed incomes. Their plan leaves huge gaps in catastrophic coverage, leaving our seniors to again choose between filling their prescriptions, or filling their shopping carts

Providing an affordable, reliable, and available prescription drug benefit for our seniors is imperative. I voted against the sham Republican Medicare prescription drug bill passed in the House and I pledge that I will continue to fight for real health and prescription drug benefits for our seniors.