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This chartpack provides a snapshot of racial/ethnic differences in Medicare beneficiaries? prescription drug coverage, use, and spending. It examines patterns separately for beneficiaries under age 65 and 65+. The summary discusses the relevance of the key findings to the current policy debates about prescription drug coverage.
Chartpack (.pdf)
Kaiser/HRET Survey: 2002 State Employee Health Plans
State employee health plans provided coverage for 3.4 million state government employees in 2002. The Kaiser/HRET Survey: 2002 State Employee Health Plans finds that premiums for state employee health plans increased 12.8% in 2002, similar to national averages. It also finds that state employee plan premiums are slightly more expensive than the national average and that state workers’ contributions are less expensive than the average U.S. firm.
The Kaiser/HRET Survey: 2002 State Employee Health Plans is a supplement to the annual Kaiser/HRET Employer Health Benefits Survey, and offers an overview of health insurance practices among state employee plans and U.S. firms.
Low-income assistance is a key feature of the Medicare prescription drug proposals passed by the House (H.R. 1) and the Senate (S.1). The attached tables present national and state-level data on the number of low-income elderly and disabled Medicare beneficiaries who may be eligible for additional assistance, based on the income eligibility thresholds specified in the House and Senate proposals (135%, 150%, and 160% of poverty).
This report presents information on the number of children enrolled in SCHIP for each state, for specific months from 1998 to December 2002. As of December 2002, the SCHIP program covered 3.7 million low-income children. An increase of 280,000 children during 2002.
The latest survey of eligibility rules and enrollment and renewal procedures in all 50 states and the District of Columbia in their Medicaid and SCHIP programs for children and parents. It reflects changes states implemented between January 2002 and April 2003. The current survey also solicited information about states premiums and cost-sharing practices.
This publication provides state-by-state enrollment information and identifies national trends from the data. The report focuses on the five-year period from June 1997 to June 2002. In June 2002,total Medicaid enrollment in the United States reached over 38.1 million persons. This was an increase of nearly 3.2 million Medicaid enrollees from June 2001, or anannual increase of 9.2 percent.
These briefing charts provide background information on prescription drug use and spending among the Medicare population, recent survey data on employers’ likely reaction to a Medicare drug benefit, an overview of the proposals for prescription drug coverage passed by the House and Senate at the end of June 2003, and a summary of the key issues to be resolved in the conference.
This updated document, prepared by Health Policy Alternatives, Inc., provides a side-by-side comparison of the House and Senate Medicare proposals, as passed on June 27, 2003. The side-by-side describes key provisions of H.R. 1, The Medicare Prescription Drug and Modernization Act of 2003, and S. 1, The Prescription Drug and Medicare Improvement Act of 2003. This updated document, which includes CBO’s recent estimates of the costs of each bill and additional detail on payments to plans and the provisions on premium support in the House bill, has been prepared as part of the Foundation’s continuing effort to track the Medicare prescription drug debate. The Foundation will be releasing a longer, more-detailed comparison of the two bills in the near future and will continue to update this side-by-side to reflect the conference agreement.
provides comprehensive data on the impact of HIV/AIDS epidemic on Latinos in the United States. Based on the most recent data and research on the epidemiology of HIV/AIDS among Latinos, the report includes an overview and epidemic profile, as well as data on major trends, access to and use of health services, and perceptions of HIV/AIDS.
Chartpack (.pdf)
Health News Index May/June, 2003
The Health News Index measures public attention to and knowledge about leading health stories covered in the news between May 1-30. The Health News Index is designed to help news media and people in the health field gain a better understanding of which health stories Americans are following and what they understand about those issues.