Medicare staffing raises alarm with open enrollment underway
Source: The Hill
10/28/25 2:08 PM ET
Health policy experts on Tuesday urged the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to boost staffing, noting that the government shutdown has only hindered services. This staffing shortage couldn’t have come at a worse time, as open enrollment for Medicare plans began earlier this month.
“We don’t have the infrastructure right now in place to really make sure those benefits get delivered well and get communicated well,” said Jon Blum, a health policy expert at the University of Southern California, at The Hill’s “Bang For Your Buck: Get the Most from your 2026 Medicare Drug Benefits” event, sponsored by the Alliance for Aging Research.
“I think we really have to have a conversation together regarding what is the right staffing needs that we need at CMS, and I would argue strongly that it’s far too low right now, and that’s going to have impact throughout the country,” he added. Last week, CMS called furloughed workers back to work for this year’s open enrollment season.
Forty-seven percent of CMS workers were placed on furlough when the government ran out of funding on Oct.1, according to the Department of Health and Human Services. And earlier this year, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made sweeping cuts across the Department of Health and Human Services, including at CMS. Blum on Tuesday said that the agency has lost 15 percent of its workers in the last few months.
Read more: https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/5577102-medicare-staffing-raises-alarm-with-open-enrollment-underway/
Well they have brainworm and Muskrat's DOGEshit to thank for waving around a chainsaw while Oz ran off in his wizard-mobile to one of his 9 mansions.
= new reply since forum marked as read
to me that is a huge perk with traditional Medicare 