Honors Blog #1

Medicare is a system that was first started by President Lyndon Johnson that was set up in 1965. President Johnson felt that "it was the government's duty to provide medical insurance to its elderly residents." This plans purpose was originally to provide a hospital insurance program for the elderly under the Social Security Act with a "supplementary medical benefits program and an extended program of medical assistance", to better the benefits under the Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance System, to improve the Federal-State public assistance programs, and for other purposes. This plan did not just develop over night. There was 20 years of debate that lead up to the passing of Medicare, but Lyndon Johnson lead the way until the end.

The Medicare system is made up of two parts. The first part is Part A and the second part it Part B. Part A Medicare covers all hospital expenses such as diagnostic tests, doctors' fees, inpatient stays and meals. The Part B plan then offers standard medical coverage for expenses such as outpatient surgery, medical equipment and "primary care". Today, the Medicare system has additional parts to it such as Part C and Part D. These parts allow the Medicare costumers to choose between an HMO or PPO plan to customize an insurance policy that fits their needs, and for prescriptions, the Part D plan uses private insurance companies to help the Medicare customers to pay for their medications. All citizens of the United States that are or over 65 or have a disability can have Medicare.

One thing that people commonly think about Medicare is that Medicare is a free health care program. In reality, the technical truth is that all US citizens are paying to have Medicare available because the tax money that the government receives pays for Medicare and that total amount that they receive each year is about two hundred and seventy seven dollars in total. While Medicare does not come cheap technically, it is still something that every US citizen should care about having around because eventually, it will affect us all.