Presidential Candidates’ Positions on Health

HEALTHCARE

Healthcare: Analysis of Medicare-Medicaid and Presidential Candidates’ Positions on Health

Medicare and Medicaid are two types of health coverage granted to people above 65 years or who have a low socioeconomic status (Cotton et al., 2016; Allen et al., 2021). They are run by the same government but are separate in certain terms. This paper aims to analyze how both the Presidential campaigns and their candidates stand by their positions of these two health insurance plans and how Covid 19 has impacted the politicization of both of them.

Part 1: Grid

Table 1: A separate description of basic coverage under Medicaid and Medicare (Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, 2018)

Medicare

Medicaid

Intended to provide services for people aging 65 years or above, disabled individuals or suffering from end-stage renal illnesses (ESRD)

Intended to provide services to individuals belonging to low socioeconomic segment, pregnant women and children

Part A: Hospital insurance

Provides services for inpatient hospitals, nursing facilities with the required skills, hospice, and certain services for home health.

For these facilities, Medicaid could be used as a last resort as it pays at the end, where Medicare is the primary payer of the premium.

Part B: Medical insurance

The expert physicians provide services, outpatient care is included in this program, medical equipment used is long-lasting, and particular other precautionary services

If an individual has Medicare coverage and wants to have Part B benefits, he would be automatically enrolled in the Medicare Savings Program (MSP). The premium would be paid by Medicaid (Medicare Interactive. Org-a, n.a.).

Part C: Medical advantage (MA)

Private insurance companies that Medicare approves are responsible for providing above part A and B services along with covering substance abuse patients and add-on benefits

Same as part B.

Part D: Prescription drug benefit

Drug insurance plans that private Medicare-approved coverage companies provide for this area

Some of the drugs are covered by Medicaid that is not present in Medicare coverage. For example, anorexia, weight gain or loss, problems in fertility, and those helping in getting relief from cold and cough (Medicare Interactive. Org-b, n.a.).

Grid Explanation

The grid indicates some of the differences between the two medical coverage provided within the United States. As the focus of both coverage plans is different from each other, for example, Medicare provides coverage to the aging population, disabled and ESRD patients, the Medicaid highlights the poor population, pregnant women, and children. Most of the facilities in medical insurance are covered through Medicare in parts A, B, C, and D; Medicaid helps cover those parts that are either not included in Medicare or could be used as a last-ditch effort from Medicaid.

Key Changes in Both Programs under Affordable Care Act (ACA)

After the President signed the contract in 2010, ACA struggled to reduce the uninsured rate by 16 percent that successfully came down to 9 percent by 2016 (Rapfogel, Gee & Calsyn, 2020). In the year 2014, expansion was made in Medicaid for allowing private coverage as well. ACA and Medicaid together insure more people than the targeted ones without discrimination in income levels, racial disparities, and even including children and old people. Low-income people are conveniently able to access healthcare services that were record low before, such as mental illnesses, outpatient visits, cancer, and substance abuse cases, that resulted in benefits like receiving care from a personal doctor, having regular follow-ups, and decreased re-hospitalization rates (Kino & Kwachi, 2018; Griffith, Evans & Bor, 2017; Brown et al., 2021). There was even more access to certain prescription drugs for low-income people, the disabled and the elderly, and diminishing taxes on those medicines. This helped in lowering the mortality rates of less privileged ones. The eligibility criteria became less strict and welcomed more people to get enrolled who were not eligible before.

For Medicare, most of the changes have been described for the elderly and disabled people under the Medicaid program that applied to Medicare. The gap in the part D facilities was reduced (Rapfogel, Gee & Calsyn, 2020); the prescription drugs were made more reachable to a greater number of people. Old people did not have to pay the full costs of most of the medicines.

Basic Proposed Differences in Two Presidential Campaigns in the Light of Covid 19

Under the two presidential campaigns in the year 2020, Biden and Trump were competing with each other. In each campaign, there were proposed differences between the two medical coverage plans. Trump tried to get ineligible enrolled participants in the medical insurance programs, both Medicaid and Medicare, so that the fittest ones should be served and more renewals were required. In contrast, Biden tried to include as many people as possible (Ellerbeck, 2021). It is because Covid 19 arrived that required more people to be covered by the Medicaid insurance under Biden’s presidency.

Biden’s party is working for the revocation of the obligation for Medicaid insurance seekers to attend educational programs so that they become qualified for receiving benefits (Ellerbeck, 2021). Trump wanted the people to work so that they do not remain poor, and those who were poor were disallowed for the Medicaid program. Under Trump’s presidency, getting more jobs meant lesser coverage for the poor as premium assistance was reduced (Levitt, 2020). On the other hand, Biden’s party is working to give extended coverage to pregnant women for a critical time after childbirth up to a full year. It is even interesting to note that prisoners and immigrants were also granted easy access to medical coverage. Home-based care and its investment have expected to rise under Biden’s reign, for which infrastructure would be expanded to give home-based coverage for the disabled and elderly people.

Research suggested that politicization in the Coronavirus period had been evident from the year 2019 in newspapers and TV news (Hart, Chinn & Soroka, 2020). The study used the politicization dictionary and the general dictionary to see how news coverage through television and newspapers has included words and phrases that targeted Covid 19 and their political efforts to highlight their presidential parties. The results showed that President Trump and his party efforts were underlined more clearly through newspaper news, and the scientific efforts in the field of Coronavirus were kept in line with it. The patterns of politicization were dissimilar to those in the newspaper and the TV coverage, though the reason has been unknown. The names of politicians were mentioned more times in the newspapers as compared to scientists’ names. With the advent of the pandemic, more elderly and low-income segments of the population area were made eligible by Biden presidential party to be counted in under the protection umbrella. They are unable to get out of their homes, and nursing facilities have been made near those communities to avoid the Coronavirus spread. Not only was the coverage increased for more people, but it was also made easier to enroll. It is expected that Biden would make more investments for tracking coronavirus variants.

In general, both the political parties have different takes on Medicare and Medicaid. The social constructions of the target population have impacted the policy-making for the political parties (Schneider & Ingram, 1993). Trump mismanaged Coronavirus news initially, calling it a hoax or a short time illness that would pass (Abutaleb et al., 2020). He kept keeping the Medicare and Medicaid enrollment criteria stringent, making it more difficult for the poor to become qualified. In contrast, Biden wanted more inclusion and better infrastructure to gain healthcare access even at home during critical times like Covid 19. There was lesser discrimination based on race, income, and age and more benefits for all.

Part 2: Analysis

After analyzing the situation under both presidencies and the basic differences in Medicare and Medicaid programs, it has been discovered that disparities were on the rise during Trump’s time in power. In contrast, Biden tried on the maximum level to broaden the scope of insurance for all races and population segments such as children, women, and the elderly on an equal basis. However, students were seen abandoned; still, the consumer protections provided under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) revealed that students would be given certain health benefits based on the programs they are enrolled in. they would be considered ‘individual health insurance coverage’ (Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, n.a.).