AMD: A Policy Blueprint to Protect America’s At-Risk Seniors
Age-Related Macular Degeneration (AMD)
A Policy Blueprint to Protect America’s At-Risk Seniors
September 2006
While the conclusions and recommendations contained in this report are solely the responsibility of The Seniors Coalition, the Coalition gratefully acknowledges the support of the AMD Alliance International and individual TSC members in providing funding for this project.
Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the leading cause of blindness and visual impairment in Americans over the age of 50. Today, over 15 million seniors live with AMD and more than 1.6 million have vision loss as a result of the disease in its late stages of progression. AMD patients age 75 and older are particularly susceptible to the vision loss and blindness the disease causes. As the over-50 and over-75 population subsets continue to grow rapidly, so too does the incidence of the disease and its disabling effects on those living with it. The consequences are serious, not only for its victims and their quality of life, but also for Medicare and other government services presently unprepared for the macro-level effects of AMD at what experts warn will reach “epidemic proportions.”
AMD’s disabling effects already impose heavy costs on the national economy and federal government. Vision impairment and eye disease currently cost the U.S. an estimated $68 billion annually in healthcare expenditures, reduced productivity, and diminished quality of life,2 with $4 billion of that amount attributable to lost taxable income and benefits.3 Today, the visually impaired are the second largest group of people classified as “disabled” in the U.S.,4 and, largely because of AMD, the vast majority of these are seniors. To illustrate how disproportionately this disability afflicts older Americans: Although people age 80 and over currently make up just 8 percent of the population, they account for 69 percent of the nation’s blind and visually impaired.
The extent to which AMD-derived vision loss diminishes quality of life cannot be overstated. Its limiting effects include loss of the ability to drive, increased vulnerability to injury, reduced social interaction, and often, depression. Even the simplest of daily tasks can become impossible to carry out in the face of AMDimposed blindness. According to the National Center for Policy Research for Women & Families, 25 percent of blind men and 30 percent of blind women over age 75 report a total inability to perform any personal care activities whatsoever. As such, it is not surprising that late-stage AMD often forces its sufferers to seek full-time care in nursing home and similar facilities, most of which operate on public funding and a shortage of which is likely impending as the senior visually disabled population burgeons.
The specific numbers related to a forthcoming spike in the senior visually disabled population are staggering. As aforementioned, an estimated 1.6 million seniors now suffer from late AMD vision loss. Within the next 5 years, the National Eye Institute (NEI) estimates that 8 million seniors are at risk for losing vision from AMD. In their landmark 2002 study, “Vision Problems in the U.S.,” Prevent Blindness America and NEI warn that the number of Americans with age-related eye disease – chief of which is AMD – will likely double within the next three decades.
The Seniors Coalition represents this largest at-risk population for vision problems. We believe strongly that in light of (a) the existing and projected prevalence of AMD among the nation’s rapidly expanding senior population, (b) the heavy toll that AMD exacts on its victims’ independence and quality of life, and (c) the immensity of AMD-related costs to state and federal systems, Members of Congress and other government decisionmakers must act quickly to enact policies aimed at accomplishing the following:
- Confront and rectify the lack of education among at-risk seniors;
- Increase rates of early detection and diagnosis for AMD;
- Improve AMD research funding;
- Improve FDA resources for AMD therapy review and approval;
- Direct CMS to provide for full, near-term Medicare coverage for low vision rehabilitation services; and
- Improve coordination between FDA and CMS.
The information that follows provides additional details on each of these areas. To read the full report please download the PDF report below.
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