Contact:
Ashley Prime
202/457-1110
aprime@qga.com

Alliance Launches Print Ads

Advertisements in Select Congressional Districts Applaud Members for
Voting to Not Cut Medicare to Elderly in Nursing Homes

WASHINGTON, DC – The Alliance for Quality Nursing Home Care (the “Alliance”) today announced the launch of print advertising in three congressional districts applauding Representatives Phil English (R-PA), Brad Ellsworth (D-IN) and Heath Shuler (D-NC) for voting against HR 3162, the so-called “CHAMP Act,” which proposed deep cuts in Medicare funds for seniors who need nursing home. 

The ads (available here) will run in the following markets beginning today:  Erie, Pennsylvania; Evansville, Indiana; and Asheville, North Carolina.  Each advertisement mentions the Member of Congress with constituents in that market.  These advertisements are part of a significant TV and print advertising campaign that the Alliance is running throughout the health care funding debate.

“The Alliance believes that protecting the most vulnerable Americans is one of Congress’ most important jobs,” said Alan Rosenbloom, President of the Alliance.  “We absolutely support expansion of SCHIP.  Vulnerable children need and deserve health care.  But so do vulnerable seniors.  We applaud Representatives English, Ellsworth and Shuler for recognizing that funding for children’s health care should be provided without Medicare cuts that will harm the elderly who receive nursing home care.”
 
“Nursing homes have achieved quality improvements in recent years.  But stable Medicare funding is essential to maintain and sustain quality improvements.  Cuts in Medicare payments would imperil quality and would harm not only the 1.7 million elderly and disabled citizen s who receive nursing home care, but also the hundreds of thousands of dedicated caregivers who provide it.”               

###

The Alliance for Quality Nursing Home Care (www.aqnhc.org) is a coalition of 16 of the nation’s largest skilled nursing providers who deliver care to hundreds of thousands of patients on a daily basis.