Home Health & Hospice Week

Slower Medicare spending means the Medicare trust fund now is projected to last until 2026, according to the latest Medicare Trustees’ Report released May 31. Last year’s report indicated Medicare would go broke in 2024.

Part A spending is growing faster than taxes are coming in to pay for the program, and the Part A coffers will be empty by 2026 unless the government takes action, according to the report. Part B and Part D accounts "are adequately financed under current law, since premium and general revenue income are reset each year to match the expected costs," the report notes. "Such financing, however, would have to increase faster than the economy to match expected expenditure growth under current law."

Affordable Care Act reforms "aim to reduce spending while improving the quality of care, and are an important down payment on solving Medi-care’s long term financial issues," CMS Admini-strator Marilyn Tavenner says in a statement. Between 2010 and 2012, Medicare spending per beneficiary grew at 1.7 percent annually, which was slower than expected.

If Congress takes no action to correct Medicare’s depleting funds, the program will be able to cover just 87 percent of estimated expenditures in 2026, and only 71 percent of projected costs in 2050, CMS notes. "Congress and the executive branch must work closely together with a sense of urgency to address these challenges," says the report at http://downloads.cms.gov/files/TR2013.pdf.