| WASHINGTON,
D.C. – U.S. Representative Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) today signed an online
petition, www.fairdrugprices.org,
calling for an affordable and voluntary prescription drug benefit through
Medicare. House and Senate Democrats launched the petition at a news
conference.
“Senior
citizens are cutting pills in half to make their prescriptions last longer
or risking strokes or heart attacks by not taking their pills at all.
Those senior citizens, their families and every person who is being price-gouged
for their medications are looking to us for relief. Democrats are
ready to provide that relief with a comprehensive, affordable, and voluntary
prescription drug benefit under Medicare,” Schakowsky said.
Medicare
beneficiaries -- seniors and people with disabilities -- are the heaviest
users of prescription drugs, yet there is no outpatient drug benefit in
Medicare to help them pay for the prescriptions they need.
-
Seniors
account for 43 cents of every dollar spent in the US on prescription drugs.
-
Medicare
beneficiaries spend, on average, more than $1,000 per year out-of-pocket
on prescription drugs.
-
Twenty-seven
percent of Medicare beneficiaries do not have any prescription drug insurance.
At
the same time that millions lack drug coverage, drug prices are rising
well above the rate of inflation. Ever rising drug prices hit the millions
who lack drug coverage -- particularly Medicare beneficiaries -- the hardest.
-
From
1997 through 2001, national spending on prescription drugs rose almost
20 percent each year.
-
From
January 1996 to January 2001, the prices of the prescription drugs most
frequently used by seniors rose nearly twice the rate of inflation.
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