The United Bermuda Party (UBP) has described a Government plan to underwrite subscriptions for the elderly of up to $1,000 a year as "woefully inadequate".

Acting Finance Minister Paula Cox announced earlier this month in the House of Assembly that all people aged 65 and older in the Health Insurance Plan would get a $1,000 a year prescription benefit, worth around $2 million per year in total.

But last night Opposition candidate Hilary Soares said a UBP plan announced last month would do far more for seniors.

The UBP says if it wins power it will pilot a free senior health care clinic, and free prescription drugs and eyeglasses to those who cannot afford them.

"The Minister announced the PLP was looking at a plan to underwrite prescriptions to the elderly of up to $83 a month," said Mrs. Soares, a former nurse who is UBP candidate for Devonshire North Central.

"I did an informal survey with a pharmacist this week and learned that seniors' prescription costs in his pharmacy ranged up to $6000 a year, with the majority of them being in the $2,500 a year range.

"Less than $1000 a year is less than half the cost of prescriptions to the average senior. That is woefully inadequate. While it certainly promises to reduce the burden on seniors a little, it doesn't go nearly far enough.

Some seniors with forced to make a decision about whether to buy food or prescription drugs, and the PLP plan "promises simply to stave off the inevitable for a few more months.

"What you have to understand is that when a senior is forced to miss his or her medication because it isn't affordable, the likelihood of that senior becoming really ill a burden on Bermuda's healthcare system, if not the public purse gets much greater.

" There must be a genuine urgency to putting in place a plan that both meets the growing needs of our seniors, but just as importantly, treats them with the respect and high level of care they so richly deserve, not as the second class citizens the current systems treats them as."