Medicare Part D Low-Income Subsidy: SSA Continues to Approve Applicants, but Millions of Individuals Have Not Yet Applied

To help the elderly and disabled with prescription drug costs, the Congress passed the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement and Modernization Act of 2003 (MMA), which created a voluntary outpatient prescription drug benefit (Medicare Part D). A key element of the prescription drug benefit is the low-income subsidy, or "extra help," available to Medicare beneficiaries with limited income and resources to assist them in paying their premiums and other out-of-pocket costs. To assess the Social Security Administration's (SSA) implementation of the subsidy, GAO is providing information on (1) the number of applicants approved for or denied the low-income subsidy and (2) challenges of identifying individuals eligible for the subsidy and targeting outreach efforts. This statement is based on a prior GAO report on the subsidy and associated spending issued in May 2007, selected aspects of which we updated in May 2008.