Health-care reform saves billions

The first year of President Obama’s sweeping health-care-reform law saved 3.6 million elderly Americans $2.1 billion in health-care expenditures, or about $604 per beneficiary.

The results are among the first tangible effects of the health-care overhaul, which Obama signed into law in March 2010, according to the Los Angeles Times. With looming elections, the announcement comes as the Obama administration attempts to generate support for the reform. The biggest changes, like the guarantee that health-care coverage will be available to all citizens regardless of pre-existing conditions, will not go into effect until 2014.

In 2011, beneficiaries were provided with a 50 percent and 7 percent discount on brand-name and generic drugs, respectively. Those discounts are set to rise to 75 percent each by 2020.