Social Security retirees are set to get a 5.9% cost-of-living raise in January, but with inflation running at 6.4%, and much of that raise slated to disappear into Medicare’s maw, they’ll be left much poorer.
A major part of the Medicare premium hike is due to a controversial Alzheimer’s drug that is extremely expensive and may not even work. The pharma company’s pricing of the drug has come under fire (see story here). And Medicare hasn’t even decided whether to pay for it. The premium increase is for that “contingency.”
Now, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) “is calling on the Biden administration to delay” that premium increase.
In a letter to the president, “He said the administration should delay Medicare’s approval for use of Aduhelm until it is deemed safe and effective, and take executive action to reinstate and expand the reasonable pricing clause requiring drug makers that receive federal funding to charge reasonable prices for prescription drugs and treatment,” The Hill reported on Friday, December 3, 2021 (read story here).
That, of course, doesn’t mean the administration will. The possibility of Medicare having to pay for a drug treatment costing $56,000 a year is responsible for half of the Medicare Part B premium increase. The other half is medical inflation in expenses like doctor visits.