A White House report released Monday said health reform will cut Medicare spending by a half trillion dollars over the next decade while extending the life of the Medicare Trust Fund by 12 years.

A report prepared by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services actuary said the four-month-old health legislation will slash Medicare spending by more than $575 billion over the next 10 years and result in nearly $8 billion in savings by 2011.

The report says that by implementing changes called for by the Affordable Care Act, such as bundling payments for dialysis and docking hospitals with high rates of preventable infections, it also "extends the life of the Medicare Trust Fund by 12 years from 2017 to 2029, more than doubling the time before the exhaustion of the Trust Fund."

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