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Chicago Tribune
28-04-2025
- Health
- Chicago Tribune
Column: Advocates warn proposed Trump budget cuts and agency changes put senior services at risk
Diane Slezak, president and CEO of AgeOptions, has worked in the aging services sector helping to meet the needs of seniors for nearly 50 years. 'I have never encountered a moment as challenging and concerning as the one we face now,' she said. Slezak and other advocates are worried about the risks facing seniors posed by the Trump administration proposed $880 billion cuts to Medicaid and other U.S. Department of Health and Human Services funding, massive job cuts and other changes affecting programs that have long served the elderly. AgeOptions is the Area Agency on Aging for suburban Cook County. That includes the south suburbs where more than 188,000 adults ages 60 and older reside. The nonprofit partners with agencies to connect older adults and caregivers with resources and services and funds senior services programs. In recent weeks, the Trump administration announced the Health and Human Services Department was slashing 10,000 jobs. That included cutting half of the staff at the Administration for Community Living, responsible for implementing the Older Americans Act. The act supports a range of health and health-related social services programs for adults ages 60 and older and individuals with disabilities to help them live independently. That includes home-delivered and congregate meals programs, transportation to medical appointments, personal care assistance, respite care for caregivers, health and wellness programs, falls prevention and elder abuse prevention programs and other health and wellness programs. The agency is also responsible for supporting the funding for more than 600 area agencies on aging nationwide, Slezak noted. In Fiscal Year 2024, Illinois agencies funded under the Older Americans Act assisted 478,113 older adults and caregivers, including 32,551 in Chicago's south suburbs served by AgeOptions, according to Slezak. As part of the Trump administration's planned restructuring of the Health and Human Services, Older Americans Act programs will be moved to other agencies, and the proposed department budget calls for eliminating funding for some programs including senior health promotion and disease prevention programs, the Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program, Adult Protective Services support, and other elder abuse, neglect and exploitation efforts, notes the National Council on Aging. It would also no longer fund the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, which helps seniors and others with their heating and electricity bills, Aging and Disability Resource Centers and the State Health Insurance Assistance Program, which provides counseling to help seniors enrolling in Medicare. Older Americans Act-funded programs play a vital role and help seniors avoid more costly nursing home care, advocates note. For example, according to Meals on Wheels America, the cost of home-delivered meals for one senior for the entire year is $2,602 while the cost of one day of hospital care is $2,754 and for 10 days in a long-term care facility, the cost is $2,070. The proposed changes are occurring at a time when the need for senior services is growing and when programs have long been underfunded, said Slezak. The population of seniors is set to reach 91 million nationally by 2030, according to Meals on Wheels America, which also notes one in two older adults living alone lack the income to pay for basic needs and 12 million older adults face financial challenges that impact their ability to age at home. From 2010 to 2013, the number of adults ages 60 and older in the southern townships increased by more than 42,000 while the number younger than that dropped by more than 64,000, she said. 'Older Americans are one of the most rapidly growing populations,' said Slezak. 'We have in Illinois 25% of the population now over age of 60. Funding needs to be increased and not paused or terminated.' The restructuring at Health and Human Services included laying off 10 Administration for Community Living regional administrators and veteran career staff in key roles along with experts in budgeting, grants, policy, evaluation and communications, and is disrupting the agency's functions, Slezak said. The changes, including fragmenting services into different departments, will make them less efficient and effective, she stressed. She worries seniors will fall through the cracks. She's also concerned about any potential slowdown in funding for agencies that provide services to seniors. She cited a recent USAging survey that noted 38% of agencies would have to reduce services within two weeks of a funding disruption. According to AgeOptions, statewide, without Older Americans Act funding, some of the monthly losses would include: 183,209 fewer home-delivered meals 154,971 fewer congregate meals served 30,264 fewer contacts providing information, assistance and outreach 14,933 fewer rides provided to older adults 'That is just unimaginable,' Slezak said. 'It's just unfathomable. I can't even think about it.' The state would never be able to make up for that funding, she said. Medicaid provides health care coverage for 654,000 people ages 50 and over in Illinois, according to AARP. Elaine Grande, executive director of Palos Heights-based eldercare services provider Pathlights, said the organization is closely monitoring the proposed cuts and changes and said it's essential to raise awareness on the proposed cuts 'and just how detrimental they could be for older adults in our communities. 'At Pathlights, we remain committed to advocating for older adults, providing accurate information, and emphasizing the critical importance of programs like Medicaid, SHIP and those under the Older Americans Act.' The statewide aging network is working together to build awareness, advocate for services and ensure the needs of older adults are recognized and met, she said. 'I'm very concerned about all the cuts and all the changes,' said U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly, a Democrat from Matteson. 'That puts services and care for older Americans and people with disabilities at risk.' Earlier this month, Kelly unsuccessfully sought to meet with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for an explanation on recent layoffs and the restructuring. She and other senior advocates note cuts in staffing at the Social Security Administration are also negatively affecting seniors with reports of people calling the agency and having to wait four and five hours to reach anyone to get help with services. Constituents have voiced their concerns, said Kelly, who noted two town halls she held recently attracted 11,000 and 13,000 people. 'Seniors, their children and grandchildren, everybody is concerned,' she said. 'They're worried about what's going to happen to services.' While Democrats are limited in what they can do legislatively to block the proposed changes given Republican majorities in the U.S. House and U.S. Senate, Kelly praised lawsuits filed by advocates and intervention by the courts. Those being negatively affected and or opposed to the cuts and changes must speak up, said Kelly. 'This is not the time to stay on the sidelines,' she said. She encouraged people to contact their senators and representatives. The area agencies on aging in Illinois are organizing a statewide advocacy day on May 28 to elevate the importance of senior services and the critical role they play in the lives of older adults across the state, said Grande. For more advocacy information visit AgeOptions and click on the advocacy tab.
Yahoo
17-03-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Medicaid is already underfunded — and the GOP wants to make it worse
Victoria Ellen Bruce, my mom's younger sister, loved to play bid whist, hear a good joke and never saw a purse she didn't need. 'Oooh, girl, give it here,' she'd say on the regular. Aunt Vicki, who lived with multiple sclerosis for most of her adult life, died last year at a long-term residential facility where not even my mother's dogged and formidable advocacy kept her from being neglected. Most people living in long-term care facilities are on Medicaid. The program keeps them alive, paying for their care and housing. Shamefully, my House Republican colleagues just passed a budget proposal that cuts Medicaid to help fund tax breaks for wealthy Americans. Medicaid needs more money, not less. The loss of Aunt Vicki has been painful for my family. My mother grieves every day. She thinks about her, talks about her and cries over her. Losing a younger sibling is incredibly hard, especially one as full of life, love, hope and faith as my aunt. Just as Aunt Vicki's nursing career was taking off, we would go out to places and she would fall. It didn't happen often but, after too many of these unresolvable episodes, she went in for tests and was diagnosed with the debilitating and incurable disease that is MS. We were all shocked. No one else in the family had ever had MS. The falls became more frequent. She was not able to continue her nursing career. A walker led to a wheelchair, a scooter and eventually a bed at a long-term residential facility. My aunt had the best caregivers in my grandmother (a nurse) and my mom (a Leo). They both fought hard against the system. Aunt Vicki loved receiving phone calls from me. We would talk, laugh and share stories. Eventually, she would tell me about some grievance with the nursing home, and then she would say how grateful she was for my mother for making it right. We should all be so lucky to have a caregiver as fierce as my mom. In January, my mom came to Washington to watch me get sworn into Congress. Before she left, we discussed an article she had read about Melinda Lunday, who works for the Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program. The ombudsman's job is to visit assisted living facilities and residential care homes to ensure that patients, our family members, are not abused. Through my own research, I read about a patient who died after mistaking cleaning chemicals for juice. In some facilities, elderly individuals or patients with disabilities have gone unwashed for more than a year, do not get their teeth brushed regularly or are forced to sleep overnight in soiled briefs. Again, even with my mother staying as vigilant as she was, Aunt Vicki was neglected by the system. As the MS worsened, she needed more consistent and observant care, but her health and safety became increasingly compromised because she didn't get what she deserved. The disease eventually made her completely bedridden. Because she stayed in the same position for hours at a time without being moved, she developed bed sores that turned into open wounds. The first time mom saw one of Aunt Vicki's wounds, she said, 'It was so deep, I could see to the bone.' My mother would ride the nursing home administrators. That is the life of a caregiver. She would visit regularly, write letters, make phone calls and chew people out; Vicki's care would improve for a little while and then backslide again. In 2023 and 2024, annual federal funding for the nationwide ombudsman program was set at $22 million and $27 million, well below what's needed to fund the recommended ombudsmen-per-bed ratios. In 2023, there were 202,894 complaints regarding long-term care facilities, but only 4,943 ombudsmen staff and volunteers available to investigate. That is a disgrace. For many patients, their only advocate and hope is an ombudsman. Without them, many of our loved ones will suffer and die. That's why it's so unconscionable that Republicans are trying to slash Medicaid when it helps states pay for this critical program and others like it. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., is lying when he says Republican cuts will not touch Medicaid. According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, it's impossible to cut $880 billion from the House Energy and Commerce Committee budget, which Republicans want to do, without gutting Medicaid, Medicare or the Children's Health Insurance Program. It's mathematically unavoidable. Caregivers like my mom and patients like my aunt deserve a Medicaid program that is properly resourced so that it works for those who rely on it. Government programs cannot be efficient if workers are fired, funding is slashed and services are eliminated. I encourage people who've had an Aunt Vicki in their life to share their stories with their representative in Congress. We must breathe life into Medicaid with our experiences, so that everyone understands how vital this program is for our families and for the people we love. This article was originally published on
