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LCAO Statement on Support for Senate Inflation Reduction Act Proposals to Reduce Health Care Costs for Older Adults

Contact:
Simona Combi
Public Relations Manager
National Council on Aging
simona.combi@ncoa.org
571-572-3982

Statement of Ramsey Alwin, Chair of the Leadership Council of Aging Organizations, on Support for Senate Reconciliation Proposals to Reduce Health Care Costs for Older Adults

Arlington, VA, August 2, 2022—The Leadership Council of Aging Organizations (LCAO) supports the Senate budget reconciliation proposals in the Inflation Reduction Act to reduce Medicare prescription drug costs and continue expiring Affordable Care Act (ACA) premium subsidies.

Specifically, the coalition supports the Senate prescription drug provisions to:

Allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices
Limit drug price increases
Cap annual out-of-pocket costs at $2,000, including a smoothing mechanism to limit costs each month
Reduce premiums and cost-sharing for low-income beneficiaries

We also support proposals to provide zero cost-sharing for vaccines and cap monthly insulin costs at $35 per month.

These provisions will go a long way in making prescription drugs much more affordable for millions of older adults, including those with the lowest incomes for whom expensive medications are out of reach.

LCAO also supports the Senate proposal to extend the Affordable Care Act premium subsidies for an additional three years. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, “[A] 64-year-old Marketplace enrollee making just over four times the poverty level in West Virginia or Wyoming would have to pay more than 40% of their income for a silver plan if they lost access to the ARPA [American Rescue Plan Act] subsidies. That would amount to an increase of over 380% in their premium payment.”

In addition, we urge the Senate to include an investment in Medicaid home and community-based services, for example, by extending American Rescue Plan funding for these important services.

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The Leadership Council of Aging Organizations is a coalition of 68 national nonprofit organizations concerned with the well-being of America’s older population and committed to representing their interests in the policy-making arena. The chairing organization for the 2022-2023 year is the National Council on Aging. Learn more at https://www.lcao.org/. Follow @LCAgingOrgs.

Chair’s Letter on FY23 Budget and Appropriations

The Leadership Council of Aging Organizations (LCAO) is a coalition of national nonprofit organizations concerned with the well-being of America’s older population and committed to representing their interests in policy-making arenas. Many of the federal programs under the jurisdiction of your Appropriations Subcommittees are critical to helping millions of older adults age with dignity, health, and independence in their homes and communities and providing vital support to their family caregivers.

Read the letter.

Chair’s Letter on COVID-19 Supplemental Funding

The undersigned members of the Leadership Council of Aging Organizations (LCAO) are writing to urge Congress to swiftly and fully fund the White House’s request for supplemental appropriations to respond to the ongoing COVID-19 crisis. We thank Congress for taking action on previous COVID-19 relief funding, including on some provisions for which LCAO previously advocated.

Read the letter.

LCAO Chair Letter on Mental Health of Older Adults

Leadership Council of Aging Organizations (LCAO), a coalition of 68 national nonprofit organizations concerned with the well-being of America’s older populations, wish to highlight pathways to more affordable and accessible behavioral health services and programs for older adults. We recommend 1) facilitating the growth of the behavioral health workforce; 2) ensuring mental health parity in Medicare; 3) increasing funding for proven federal programs to achieve improvements; 4) ensuring better integration of behavioral and physical health care; 5) robustly funding crisis support; and 6) removing remaining barriers to accessing telemental health care. The body of our letter identifies major barriers to care and includes general policy recommendations, and the appendix cites specific bipartisan legislation that aims to address some, or all of the issues raised. In some cases, where there is not yet proposed legislation that would accomplish our recommendations, we urge Congress to create new bills.

Read the letter.

LCAO Chair Comments in Response to Proposed Rulemaking, Public Charge Ground of Inadmissibility

The Leadership Council of Aging Organizations is writing in response to the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS, or the Department) Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM or proposed rule) to express support for and recommendations to improve the public charge proposed rule published in the Federal Register on February 24, 2022. We believe that there should be no public charge barrier to immigrate to the U.S., and we will continue to work to change the statute.

Read the full comments.

Sign-On Letter in Support of Reestablishing the House Select Committee on Aging

On behalf of the 69 members of the Leadership Council of Aging Organizations (LCAO), I am writing to express our strong support for reestablishing the House Select Committee on Aging (HSCoA) as proposed in H. Res. 583, a Resolution introduced by Rep. David Cicilline. LCAO focuses on the well-being of America’s older population and is committed to representing their interests in the policy-making arena. We are seeking as many cosponsors as soon as possible (there are currently 41) to support this important Resolution before the session’s overall agenda would make action more difficult.

Read the letter.

Letter in Support of SSA Funding

The Leadership Council of Aging Organizations (LCAO) is a coalition of 69 national nonprofit organizations concerned with the well-being of America’s older population and committed to representing their interests in the policy-making arena. We strongly urge you to enact omnibus appropriations legislation that includes all 12 subcommittee bills for Fiscal Year 2022 and becomes effective when the continuing resolution (CR) ends. In doing so, Congress should fully fund the Administration’s request of $14.189 billion for Social Security Administration so it can fulfill its critical mission to administer the nation’s social insurance programs for the financial well-being of retirees and their survivors, disabled workers and their families, as well as the aged and blind. This is especially important because of the harm done by Covid-19.

Read the sign-on letter.

LCAO Omnibus Appropriations Letter

As members of the Leadership Coalition of Aging Organizations (LCAO), we urge you to enact omnibus Fiscal Year (FY) 2022 appropriations legislation by the time that the current continuing resolution (CR) ends on February 18 that includes all 12 subcommittee bills. Our nation continues to face the economic, health, and social impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Relying on long-term CRs would result in flat and therefore inadequate funding, which in turn impedes the capacity of programs providing critical services to individuals across the country.

Read the letter.

Chair’s Statement on Support of the Build Back Better Legislation

Leadership Council of Aging Organizations (LCAO) is a coalition of 67 national nonprofit organizations concerned with the well-being of America’s older population and committed to representing their interests in the policy-making arena.

As the Chair, I underscore LCAO’s continued strong support for the Build Back Better legislation and urge the Senate to protect and expand the bill’s resources to provide much needed assistance and relief for older adults and their families. Build Back Better contains historic investments in essential services that Americans overwhelmingly support.

Read the letter.

Statement in Support of COVID-19 Booster Shots for Older Adults and Those Who Care for Them

Due to concerns about the most recent COVID-19 variant, Omicron, and the ongoing proliferation of the Delta variant, our coalition of national nonprofit organizations concerned with the well-being of America’s older people urges all fully vaccinated older adults, and the paid and unpaid people who care for them, to receive a booster shot of one of the three available COVID-19 vaccines in the U.S. If older adults are not yet fully vaccinated, we urge them to protect themselves with COVID-19 vaccines.