{"id":4470,"date":"2016-09-27T13:45:24","date_gmt":"2016-09-27T17:45:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/?p=4470"},"modified":"2016-09-27T13:45:24","modified_gmt":"2016-09-27T17:45:24","slug":"the-gap-in-medigap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/?p=4470","title":{"rendered":"The Gap in Medigap"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>(By Tricia Neuman and Juliette Cubanski for Kaiser Family Foundation)<\/p>\n<p>Medicare provides coverage for a wide array of medical and drug benefits, but, with its deductibles, cost-sharing requirements, and lack of an annual out-of-pocket spending limit, many people on Medicare purchase Medigap supplemental insurance to help cover their out-of-pocket costs. <a href=\"https:\/\/ahip.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/MedigapEnrollmentReport_Linked.pdf\">Roughly 11 million<\/a> of the 57 million people on Medicare\u2014around 20 percent of all beneficiaries\u2014have a Medigap policy, which helps protect against catastrophic expenses, spreads costs over the course of the year, and simplifies medical bills and paperwork. Thanks to a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gpo.gov\/fdsys\/pkg\/STATUTE-104\/pdf\/STATUTE-104-Pg1388.pdf\">1990 federal law<\/a>, people age 65 and older are able to buy a Medigap policy when they sign up for Medicare, but younger Medicare beneficiaries with disabilities are not granted the same right unless they live in a state that requires it. <a href=\"http:\/\/kff.org\/medicare\/perspective\/the-gap-in-medigap\/?utm_campaign=KFF-2016-September-Younger-Medicare-Beneficiaries-Disabilities&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;utm_content=34956822&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_IK1mBgBORfh_ba2zdK85q0mB56bWjfMS5D4BmMNzjKIRwcmiGfAKF-pCW7ss-NaYMcztF470NLRu3nOdlAlJ1Vb3C7Q&amp;_hsmi=34956822\" target=\"_blank\">Continue reading here&#8230;&#8230;.<\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px; outline: 0px; border: 0px currentColor; color: #444444; text-transform: none; line-height: 1.6; text-indent: 0px; letter-spacing: normal; font-family: 'Open Sans', serif; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; word-spacing: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; font-stretch: inherit; background-color: #ffffff; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-numeric: inherit; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;\">Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation.<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px; outline: 0px; border: 0px currentColor; color: #444444; text-transform: none; line-height: 1.6; text-indent: 0px; letter-spacing: normal; font-family: 'Open Sans', serif; font-size: 15px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; word-spacing: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 1; font-stretch: inherit; background-color: #ffffff; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-numeric: inherit; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/khn-logo1.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-899 \" src=\"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/khn-logo1-300x156.png\" alt=\"khn-logo1\" width=\"92\" height=\"48\" srcset=\"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/khn-logo1-300x156.png 300w, https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/khn-logo1-1024x533.png 1024w, https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/khn-logo1-390x205.png 390w, https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/khn-logo1.png 1600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 92px) 100vw, 92px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<pre><strong>Notice<\/strong>: The link provided above connects readers to the full content of the posted article. The URL (internet address) for this link is valid on the posted date; medicarereport.org cannot guarantee the duration of the link\u2019s validity. Also, the opinions expressed in these postings are the viewpoints of the original source and are not explicitly endorsed by AMAC, Inc.; the AMAC Foundation, Inc.; or medicarereport.org.<\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(By Tricia Neuman and Juliette Cubanski for Kaiser Family Foundation) Medicare provides coverage for a wide array of medical and<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4470","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-medicare-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4470","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4470"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4470\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4471,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4470\/revisions\/4471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medicarereport.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}