AARP un-sells out -- kinda

My parents and their friends all got together to burn their AARP cards after that organization decided, what the heck, We're All Republicans Now, and endorsed the BushCo Medicare prescription drug benefit. As I touched on a couple of weeks ago, and has been discussed a bit in the comments, this multi-trillion dollar transfer from the taxpayers to the drug companies still leaves the most vulnerable seniors with unaffordable medication costs, while forbidding CMS (the Medicare administering agency) from using its purchasing power to negotiate lower prices.

AARP may have gotten the message, kinda. The organization is now categorically rejecting Bush's proposal to phase out Social Security while moving to defend Medicaid and Medicare. According to the Commonwealth Fund,

On Medicaid, AARP said "we fully recognize the budget pressures at the federal and state levels, and we will support changes to make Medicaid more efficient." But AARP "strongly opposes 'reform' efforts that would undermine the key role Medicaid plays in helping our most vulnerable citizens," including block grants.

Novelli said that as baby boomers age, there is an even greater need for long-term care, including less expensive home- and community-based care. "I am pleased to serve on the newly formed National Commission on Quality Long Term Care," he said.

The nation faces a fiscal threat not because of Medicare and Medicaid but because of the underlying problem of rising health costs, [AARP CEO William] Novelli said. "Demography is not destiny and it's not the big problem," he said. "The entire health care system faces these pressures. The most significant step we can take as a nation is to bring health care costs under control."

snip

In addition to espousing Medicare drug coverage, AARP plans to tackle the pharmaceutical access issue with a focus on drug pricing. To that end, it will spotlight price hikes and work for greater access to lower-cost imported drugs. The group also plans to push for setting spending according to evidence-based reviews of which products provide good value and pursue litigation "where warranted."

Asked for specifics, Novelli noted that AARP has litigated in the past to prevent restraint of trade in the generic drug market. No suits are imminent, "but that is part of how we go about social change."



So, they can't exactly admit that they were wrong to back the Administration Medicare prescription drug bill, which does tie their hands on going on after drug pricing directly. But when they talk about bringing health care costs under control "as a nation" there is only one thing they can possibly mean, if they are serious: national health care, and negotiated prices.

Here's the Commonwealth Fund newsletter: Commonwealth

Is there hope for AARP? Stay tuned.