Medicare premiums lower than expected

For the third year in a row, the average Medicare premium will be lower than expected.  Medicare beneficiaries will pay on average “$28 per month for their Part D prescription drug plans next year, according to an announcement by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).”  “The lower-than-projected premiums stand as further evidence that Medicare Part D, enacted by the Republican-controlled Congress in 2003 after a bitterly partisan fight with Democrats, has been a success.”  In 2003 when President Bush signed the program into law, the projected cost of premiums in 2009 was $44.