Reporter’s notebook: Walz wants to give seniors more time on Medicare
Walz and
"Many of your readers are going to see this for the first time and have no idea that they are going to lose their plan," Walz said.
The issue lies in the more than 350,000 Minnesotans who have Medicare Cost plans, a type of Medicare insurance offered by private companies. Residents will only have about 30 days at the end of the year to find a new health insurance plan.
Walz said his office expects to be inundated with calls from concerned seniors who won't have enough time to understand why they need to switch or navigate all insurance options. One agent,
"Due to the brief Medicare open enrollment window, I'm concerned that current Medicare Cost members won't have sufficient time to research and understand the options available to replace their Cost plan," Mager said in a statement as part of a Walz press release on the bill. "Even more so, I am concerned about the potential loss of network and plan flexibility that Medicare Cost plans currently provide. I cringe to think I may have to tell a client that only one of their three doctors are now in-network with their new plan."
To that end, Walz is mounting an effort to either push the switch back or make seniors across the state aware of the coming insurance changes.
Last year, the
Federal officials have tried to transition away from Cost plans for years; the deadline to do so has been pushed back in the past. Despite the current congressional turmoil over everything from the 2018 Farm Bill to tariffs and
If nothing else, he hopes the attention will make the Trump administration push the deadline back on its own.
"Basically, this is going to be a cliff that people fall over," he said.
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