News

  • Legislative Update For Week Ending January 18 2013

    Food and Drug Administration Issues Vaccine Fraud Alert .In the meantime, many Members of Congress will be holding town hall meetings to address the questions and concerns of their constituents. TSCL encourages its members and supporters to attend these town halls and to ask questions of their elected officials about important Social Security and Medicare issues, like the following four… .By Representative Tim Walberg (MI-7) … Continued

  • Legislative Update December 2016

    If adopted, the Social Security Administration Fairness Act would accomplish the following: .What do you think? Should health and drug plans be responsible for removing illegals from Medicare rolls? Take a poll on the TSCL homepage today! .According to information from the Medicare Rights Center, a nonprofit organization that provides Medicare counseling and educational programs, when you notify a Medicare Advantage plan after the move, then your mom's Special Enrollment Period begins the month you tell her plan, plus two more full months thereafter. … Continued

Key Bills Gain New Cosponsors .Give yourself a Benefits Check Up: If your savings are gone, and you aren't able to get a side job, you might qualify for programs that can help pay for Medicare Part B premiums, drug costs, meals, heating and cooling your home, rental subsidies and other costs. Using the National Council on Aging's Benefits Check Up online tool is simple. You answer a few screening questions and you can get the contact information for programs in your area. .Conference Committee Announces Compromise .White House officials and public health leaders said they don't expect a vaccine to be widely available until March or April, which means wearing masks and other non-pharmaceutical measures will likely be the only option to reduce the spread of the virus until the end of February. .TSCL's Board of Trustees Meets with Members of Congress .In case Congress is not able to come to an agreement concerning legislation to lower prescription drug prices, there are reports that President Trump is considering executive action to cut drug prices ahead of the 2020 election as he enters his re-election seeking to rebut Democratic criticism that his policies have hurt U.S. health care. .According to TSCL studies, Social Security benefits have lost more than 31% of their buying power since 2000. "Yet the vast majority of seniors can't absorb any loss in buying power," Cates says. According to the Social Security Administration, 53% of senior households depend on Social Security for more than half of their income. The median income of seniors aged 65 and older is just ,757 – only 220% above the federal poverty level for an individual. .Eight new Members of Congress signed on to the Social Security Fairness Act (H.R. 1332) this week, bringing the cosponsor total up to 11If signed into law, the Social Security Fairness Act would repeal the government pension offset (GPO) and the windfall elimination provision (WEP) of the Social Security Act. .However, there are several steps an importer would have to take to be certified to import the drugs and they are costly. If the current FDA rules are kept in place it could be that states would not see significant savings in the costs of drugs, or even enough savings to justify the cost of setting up such a program.