NAHU Hosts Briefing on Long-Term Care Partnerships

(October 16, 2003, Arlington, VA) - The National Association of Health Underwriters and MetLife co-hosted an important briefing this afternoon on long-term care partnerships. NAHU and MetLife are actively lobbying in the states and on the Hill for these programs to be offered on a favorable basis in all states. Currently, only four states (CA, CT, NY, and IN) offer long-term care partnership programs because restrictive legislative language passed by Congress as part of the Budget Act of 1993 limits state authority under Medicaid to offer partnerships. To remedy this situation Congressmen John Peterson (PA) and Earl Pomeroy (ND) recently introduced H.R. 1406 to remove the restrictive legislative language so additional states can enter into long-term care partnerships.

"Long-term care partnerships offer consumers an alternative to 'spending down' their entire life savings by forming a partnership between Medicaid and long-term care insurers," explained John Greene, director of federal affairs. "The purpose of these partnership programs is to provide access to affordable private long-term care insurance for individuals of moderate income who may not have been able to afford private coverage in the past.

"Consumers who purchase such policies are insured for covered long-term care expenses for a predetermined level of benefits through a private insurer. If the benefits under the private plan are exhausted and the individual still requires services, Medicaid will be available, but without the requirement to spend down all assets, as is usually required to meet Medicaid eligibility criteria. The individual is permitted to retain assets equal to the amount of benefits purchased under the policy, and Medicaid becomes the payer only after the long-term care partnership benefits are exhausted.

"Medicaid is now the primary payer of long-term care services, and as a result, state and federal governments bear a tremendous burden for these services. The impact of aging baby boomers will only exacerbate this problem, which will be compounded by the fact that elderly individuals often believe, mistakenly, that Medicare pays for long-term care costs. In fact, long-term care costs consume about two-thirds of a state's budget and with states running deficits, Medicaid cannot continue to support these outlays. It is critical that we do something now to encourage people to plan privately for their long-term care needs, just as they do for their other retirement needs.

"NAHU believes that long-term care partnership programs are a win-win-win situation because of their benefits to consumers, Medicaid, and private insurers. NAHU will continue to work with members of Congress and state legislators to promote long-term care partnership initiatives."

The National Association of Health Underwriters represents more than 18,000 professional health insurance agents and brokers who provide insurance for millions of Americans. For more information, please call Kelly Loussedes at 703-276-3835 or email kloussedes@nahu.org.

###

Content copyright © 1998-2008 National Association of Health Underwriters. All rights reserved.
National Association of Health Underwriters · 2000 North 14th Street, Suite 450 · Arlington, VA 22201
703.276.0220 · fax 703.841.7797 · info@nahu.org