Dear Acting Administrator Weems:
Today is the beginning of the annual marketing season for Medicare Advantage plans and Medicare prescription drug plan sponsors. Given the number and severity of problems that occurred this year, it is critical that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
(CMS) be a more proactive and authoritative regulator of Medicare insurance products.
As we have discussed, one of my top priorities as Chairman of the Finance Committee is to ensure that CMS fulfills its duty to oversee and regulate the activities of insurers and their agents who sell Medicare benefit packages directly to America’s seniors through the Medicare Advantage and the Medicare prescription drug programs.
Recently, you publicly pledged to increase oversight and enforcement of the marketing activities of Medicare Advantage plans, in particular, of private-fee-for-service Medicare plans. I hope your pledge means CMS will leave no stone unturned in its efforts to monitor marketing activities this season and that you will exercise the agency’s full authority in dealing with misconduct. CMS should hold plan sponsors to the highest standards. CMS should impose swift and significant consequences for improper behavior by the plans and their brokers and agents. I am concerned, though, that you have not made a similar commitment to oversight of the prescription drug benefit.
You and I agree that CMS must ensure that seniors who purchase a Medicare Advantage or prescription drug plan fully understand the benefits they will receive. Differences in benefits among Medicare Advantage and prescription drug plans should be easier for seniors to identify and comprehend. In addition, differences between Medicare Advantage and the traditional Medicare program should always be clear to beneficiaries before they enroll in any plan. Both Congress and CMS have more work to do in this area.
CMS has recently announced several new or expanded oversight, enforcement, outreach,
and education efforts; I asked for details about them when I wrote you on Sept. 25,
2007. Let me be clear -- I will follow the implementation of these initiatives very closely. A vigilant and watchful regulator is everyone’s best hope to protect the integrity of the Medicare program, its 40 million-plus beneficiaries, and the taxpayers who fund it.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Sincerely,
Max Baucus Chairman
Source: Ranking Member’s News
