Contrasts Cost for Birthday Fete With Needs of Poor : Roybal Raps Plans for Medicare ‘Party’

A $350,000 celebration is being planned for the 20th birthday of Medicare and Medicaid this summer by the Reagan Administration, which has called for sharp limits on spending by the two health-care programs for the elderly and the needy.

An eight-page anniversary plan, a copy of which was obtained by the Associated Press, details a series of special activities, ranging from a White House ceremony to distribution of feature articles about the two programs for weekly newspapers.

‘Misplaced Priorities’

The plan was criticized Thursday by Rep. Edward R. Roybal (D-Los Angeles), chairman of the House Select Committee on Aging, who noted that the plan’s disclosure coincides with a Los Angeles conference on Medicare and Medicaid at which the government is charging a registration fee as high as $600.

“Once again, this Administration demonstrates its misplaced priorities with regard to the poor and elderly,” Roybal said.

“The half-million dollars they are spending on the Los Angeles conference this week and the 20th anniversary celebration next month could buy America’s aged and poor 1,300 hospital days or 10,000 doctor visits or 40,000 drug prescriptions,” Roybal said.

“The bitter irony is that an Administration which has attacked Medicare and Medicaid for five straight years can turn around and celebrate the smoldering remains.”

Dennis Siebert, spokesman for the Health Care Financing Administration, which runs Medicare and Medicaid, confirmed the contents of the plan but said there probably will not be enough time to carry out every project.

He estimated the ultimate cost of the anniversary celebration at $250,000 to $350,000, which he said was small compared with the $95 billion spent annually on Medicare and Medicaid.

“What we want to do is use the occasion to call attention to the benefits,” Siebert said.

Major spending categories in the anniversary plan include $125,000 for production and distribution of a 20th-anniversary film, $90,000 for a movie depicting basic aspects of the programs, $15,000 for press kits to be distributed to 5,000 daily newspaper reporters and editors, $9,000 for weekly newspaper features and $12,500 in videotape news releases for television stations.

The document said the anniversary programs will be accomplished in a manner that “supports Administration initiatives.” But the Administration’s most significant recent initiative has been to propose sharp limits on Medicare and Medicaid spending.

Freeze Proposed

Earlier this month, the Department of Health and Human Services proposed to freeze 1986 Medicare payments to hospitals at their 1985 levels, saving the program $1.8 billion.

President Reagan has called for increases in the amount elderly people pay for Medicare “Part B” supplemental insurance. He also has proposed a cap on Medicaid payments at $22.2 billion, $1.3 billion below current cost projections.