The Medicare reform bill is the latest effort in a decades-long battle to contain MEDICAL COSTS. TIME delved into the issue during the Carter presidency, when another health-care debate raged on Capitol Hill.
Starting with Blue Cross in the 1930s ... private insurers have picked up a giant chunk of hospital-doctor bills. In 1965 Congress chipped in, providing Medicare payments for those over 65 and Medicaid assistance for the poor. There are still gaps in the coverage: the 20% or so of the bill that the typical Medicare patient must pay can be a severe burden; the long illness that exhausts...
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