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...

…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.).

Health disparities have been addressed shrewdly under Bidens rule since he knew that Covid times asked for more accessibility of healthcare and that elderly people were the most affected population segment that should provide instant care at homes. The difficulties arising from the health insurance strategies laid down by Trump are now openly addressed by Bidens govrnment by expanding access (Cole, Shafer & Gordon, 2021). Contrarily, Trump was not aware of how much this dilemma would reach globally and that his misleader ship would hurt American sovereignty across the globe.

I want to make changes within the insurance plans for the students so that clear healthcare benefits can be identified for them. These benefits include inpatient and outpatient facilities, nursing services, at-home services, and other preventive measures in Covid 19. Also, with high prevailing rates of depression in youth, especially girls (Geiger & Davis, 2019), they should be provided psychiatry services and insured medicines so that better employment opportunities should be given to the young ones and lesser economic burden could be endured by the government for lesser hospitalization costs of this segment.

In my field placement (nursing for hypertension patients), Medicare and Medicaid would support the patients and their family members fighting hypertension. For example, the highest rate of treatment for hypertension is reported in Medicare alone, followed by Medicaid compared to those who are not insured (Duru et al., 2007). Medicaid provides free-of-cost blood pressure cuffs for an individual planning to self-manage his illness and monitor blood…