Rx plan pushed for disabled

Kirsten Searer

Tuesday, Feb. 1, 2005 | 9:45 a.m.

An estimated 5,000 people with disabilities could get help with their health care costs under a plan being pushed by Assembly Majority Leader Barbara Buckley, D-Las Vegas.

Buckley said Monday she hopes to create a "Disability Rx" program that would cover Medicare co-payments, deductables and the so-called "doughnut hole" in the new federal Medicare prescription drug program.

Money for the program, she said, would come from a portion of the state's tobacco settlement fund. The state also would obtain federal matching funds.

The state's 63 legislators will meet in Carson City on Monday for the beginning of the legislative session to take up many issues, including this one.

Many people with disabilities end up using a large portion of their income on health care costs, leaving them little money to live, Buckley said.

"If you're 60 with cancer and you get $700 a month in Social Security, you can't afford the co-pays, the deductible and the doughnut hole," she said.

The "Doughnut Hole" in the new Medicare bill is a gap when patients must pay the full amount of their prescription drugs.

The Medicare drug plan works like this: Recipients pay about $750 to get their first $2,250 in drug benefits each year. After that, the doughnut hole kicks in. Patients must pay 100 percent of their drugs until their yearly drug total adds up to $5,100.

Once they hit $5,100 in drug costs, patients pay a simple $2 per generic drug, $5 per brand-name drug.

The state had planned a similar program in the 2003 legislative session to help people with disabilities, but the federal matching funds were cut, Buckley said.

"The (state) funds are there and are set aside for the waiver program that the Bush administration eliminated," Buckley said.

The state's tobacco settlement money is strictly regulated, and the funds have come in less than originally expected.

Half of the money is dedicated to health concerns, mostly to Senior Rx and programs for the aging, Buckley said. Of the rest of the pot, 40 percent goes to the Millennium Scholarship and 10 percent goes into a trust fund for health.

State Treasurer Brian Krolicki monitors the fund and has proposed ways to deal with the declining revenue, especially toward financially wobbly Millennium Scholarship.

"People are smoking less," he said.

He said he is open to talking about the program but would want to ensure it doesn't take money from other programs.

"I don't see how it wouldn't be at the cost of an existing program," he said.

A certain amount of the tobacco money is dedicated specifically to people with disabilities, and the Legislature has new control over how it is spent, Buckley said.

People with disabilities told legislators in 2003 they wanted the funds to go toward prescription drugs, respite programs, and adaptive care such as wheelchairs and voice recorders, Buckley said.

Paul Martin, president of Nevadans for Equal Access, said in a press release that his group sees people with disabilities every day "who are spending all of their money on their medicines and have no money left for necessities such as buying groceries or paying the utility bill."