{"id":81918,"date":"2026-04-22T09:51:29","date_gmt":"2026-04-22T09:51:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/insurers-refuse-to-join-medicare-pilot-offering-weight-loss-drugs-to-seniors-at-steep-discount\/"},"modified":"2026-04-22T09:51:29","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T09:51:29","slug":"insurers-refuse-to-join-medicare-pilot-offering-weight-loss-drugs-to-seniors-at-steep-discount","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/insurers-refuse-to-join-medicare-pilot-offering-weight-loss-drugs-to-seniors-at-steep-discount\/","title":{"rendered":"Insurers refuse to join Medicare pilot offering weight loss drugs to seniors at steep discount"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>WASHINGTON \u2014 The Trump administration had planned for insurers to provide cheap weight loss drugs to seniors through a Medicare pilot program. Insurers said no, so the government will instead cover the drugs outside of the Medicare Part D drug benefit.<\/p>\n<p>Last year, the Trump administration struck a deal with Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk to lower the prices of their popular obesity drugs in exchange for expanding access to those drugs in Medicare and Medicaid. Medicare is prohibited from covering weight loss drugs, but the administration proposed waiving that restriction to test whether covering the medications would save tmoney or improve health outcomes at no additional cost.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"alignleft wp-block-stat-article-recirc-single\">\n<div class=\"recirc-single-image\" data-href=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/2025\/11\/06\/trumprx-weight-loss-drug-discounts-wegovy-zepbound\/\">\n\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" width=\"768\" height=\"432\" src=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/GettyImages-1690305257-768x432.jpg\" class=\"attachment-article-main-medium-large size-article-main-medium-large\" alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 540px) and (max-width: 767px) 288px, (min-width: 768px) and (max-width: 1023px) 257px, (min-width: 1024px) and (max-width: 1199px) 287px, (min-width: 1200px) 245px, 246px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/GettyImages-1690305257-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/GettyImages-1690305257-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/GettyImages-1690305257-2048x1152.jpg 2048w, https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/GettyImages-1690305257-1600x900.jpg 1600w\"\/>\t\t<\/div>\n<h3 class=\"recirc-single-heading\">\n<div class=\"stat-plus-icon\" data-tooltip=\"Subscriber-only\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/wp-content\/themes\/stat\/images\/home\/statplus.svg\" width=\"19\" height=\"16\" alt=\"\"\/><\/div>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"sr-only\">STAT Plus: <\/span>Trump announces deal with Lilly, Novo to expand access to weight loss drugs, cut prices<br \/>\n\t\t<\/h3>\n<\/aside>\n<p>The hitch was that insurers had to agree to participate in the pilot, called BALANCE, even though they would likely have faced a financial strain from doing so. The drugmakers agreed to sell the treatments for $245 a month in Medicare and Medicaid, but Medicare promised that\u00a0 beneficiaries would only pay $50 each month.\u00a0<\/p>\n<div class=\"restricted-content-breaker article\" aria-labelledby=\"restricted-story-heading\" aria-describedby=\"restricted-story-description\" checked=\"false\">\n<div class=\"restricted-content-breaker-bar\">\n<p class=\"restricted-text\">STAT+ Exclusive Story<\/p>\n<p class=\"restricted-login\">Already have an account? Log in<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"restricted-content-breaker-bg\" src=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/wp-content\/themes\/stat\/images\/stat-plus-breaker-bg.png\" alt=\"STAT+\"\/><\/p>\n<div class=\"restricted-content-breaker-wrapper\">\n\t\t\t\t<span class=\"stat-paywall-archive\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"stat-plus-logo\" src=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/wp-content\/themes\/stat\/images\/stat-plus-logo-white.svg\" alt=\"STAT+\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 id=\"restricted-story-heading\">This article is exclusive to STAT+ subscribers<\/h2>\n<h3 id=\"restricted-story-description\">Unlock this article \u2014 plus daily coverage and analysis of the biotech sector \u2014 by subscribing to STAT+.<\/h3>\n<p class=\"restricted-content-breaker-wrapper-cta mobile\">Already have an account? Log in<\/p>\n<div class=\"restricted-content-breaker-cards\">\n<div class=\"slider-container\" aria-label=\"Subscription plan toggle\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<button type=\"button\" class=\"individual\" aria-pressed=\"false\">Individual plans<\/button><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<button type=\"button\" class=\"group\" aria-pressed=\"false\">Group plans<\/button>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>\t\t\t\tView All Plans\n\t\t\t<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"restricted-message-breaker\">\n<div class=\"restricted-content-wrapper\">\n<div class=\"restricted-content-message\">\n<p class=\"restricted-content-text\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\tTo read the rest of this story subscribe to STAT+.\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\tSubscribe\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>WASHINGTON \u2014 The Trump administration had planned for insurers to provide cheap weight loss drugs to seniors through a Medicare pilot program. Insurers said no, so the government will instead cover the drugs outside of the Medicare Part D drug benefit. Last year, the Trump administration struck a deal with Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":81919,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_daextam_enable_autolinks":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81918","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/VJHT65DGJGQOZOEYG2IXXP4A2I-1024x576.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81918","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81918"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81918\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/81919"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}