Senate Panel Sends Healthcare Reform Bill to Floor

Cited: MedPage Today

During the 5th week of deliberation on the Healthcare Reform Bill, the American Medical Association endorsed package that came out of two House of Representatives committees.  Meanwhile the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee finally completed markup of its own bill.  Passed health care reform bills have been stalled by the doctors group that sent a letter to the three House committees working on a bill saying that it approves of it.

“This legislation includes a broad range of provisions that are key to effective, comprehensive health system reform,” said AMA President James Rohack, MD.

The group lauded provisions in the bill to reform the sustainable growth rate formula used to calculate Medicare physicians’ payments, and to add additional payments for primary care physicians without reducing payments to specialists.  President Obama, who asked the AMA to support reform at its annual meeting last month in Chicago, thanked the group for backing the House bill.

“I am grateful that the doctors of the AMA have chosen to support health insurance reform that will lower costs, expand coverage, and assure choice and quality healthcare for all Americans,” Obama said in a statement.

Although the AMA’s endorsement was good news for the reform effort, the House bill had a setback on Thursday when Douglas Elmendorf, the director of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), told the House Ways and Means Committee that the bill is not budget-neutral, which has long been the promise of the president.

“The coverage proposals in this legislation would expand federal spending on healthcare to a significant degree, and in our analysis so far we don’t see other provisions in this legislation reducing federal health spending by a corresponding degree,” Elmendorf told the tax-writing committee.

Meanwhile, a contingent of Democrats on the House Education and Labor Committee spoke in support of a single-payer system — a marked difference from the Senate HELP panel, on which only Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) backed single-payer.

The system is unpopular on the Hill and was never seriously discussed — at least not publicly — as a potential part of a reform package.  But in the first day of the House Education and Labor Committee’s markup, several Democratic members said while they back the bill, they wished it included single-payer plan rather than introducing a government-run public plan to compete with private plans.

“It’s not perfect because it’s not a single-payer plan,” said Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.)

Rep. John F. Tierney (D-Mass.) also said he supports the single-payer approach, as did Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich (D-Ohio).  The House bill “further entrenches the for-profit insurance based system,” Kucinich said. What isn’t much different between the two chambers is GOP bashing of the Democrat-produced bills.

Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.), a physician, said he “left the practice of medicine . . . for precisely this moment in public policy,” but said that the current bill would result in a system “built on mandates, rationing, bureaucracy, and taking healthcare decisions away from patients and their physicians.”

But neither dismay over the lack of a single-payer plan, nor partisan squabbles held up progress. On Friday, the Education and Labor Committee sent its portion of the bill to the floor with a 26 to 22 vote, and the Ways and Means Committee passed its portion of the bill in a 23 to 18 vote.  The Energy and Commerce Committee still must approve its portion of the bill.

In the Senate

Also in the 5th week, the HELP Committee sent its final bill to the Senate floor, although it won’t likely be up for a vote until the Senate Finance Committee reports out its own bill, which could be a while considering the panel has yet to introduce a formal bill.

After a nearly month-long markup, acting HELP chairman Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) said he was disappointed that no Republicans on the committee voted for the bill, but said that “a good bill is more important that a bipartisan one.”

In a week 6, President Obama was defending his healthcare reform effort on national TV.  The push for legislation slowed on Capitol Hill as senators postponed any action until after the August recess.  However, the House appeared poised to take a vote on its bill in week 7.

The House is scheduled to begin its recess on July 31, a week before the Senate.  Two House committees — the Ways and Mean and Education and Labor — have finished work on the bill and sent it the full floor for a vote.  But the effort hit a snag in the third committee responsible for Health Care, Energy and Commerce. That panel stopped short in its markup process after approving amendments on Monday night.

Fiscally conservative “Blue Dog” Democrats oppose the cost of the bill and have said they’d vote against it if the total price tag is not significantly reduced. The plan would cost more than $1 trillion over 10 years. But on Friday, various media outlets reported that Commerce chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) had announced a “breakthrough” in negotiations and said his committee might have the votes necessary to report out the measure.

However, if the Blue Dogs stand firm in opposition, Waxman said the committee might discharge the measure and send it to the floor for a vote without its endorsement.  House Democrats plan to meet to decide their next step.

Meanwhile, President Barack Obama, who has been campaigning hard for healthcare reform in the face of Republican attacks and doubts within his own party, called a press conference and spent all but a few minutes of it promoting the plan or dealing with questions the subject.

According to J. James Rohack, M.D., president of the American Medical Association, the congressional recess will be a critical period in determining the fate of health-care legislation.

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My Take: I just wish they would hurry up and get their asses in gear and come to a decision that everybody will benefit from, namely the average citizen.  The Senators, Representatives, Congressmen and the President do not have to worry about their medical or dental because it is provided for them.  It is the rest of the nation that has to worry.  Well actually, not the whole nation just those that can afford medical or dental.

I am on disability and I get Medicare through an HMO.  I was amazed when Medicare was started to authorize money for glasses and hearing aids and thankful at the same time.  I just wish they would authorize dental care.  I need to see a dentist so bad it hurts!  If I would have had access to regular dental checkups, I would not be in this situation.

However, the government does not think dental care is needed for adults, because they will not pay for it.  They must believe that adults do not get toothaches, break teeth or need dentures.  They do seem to realize that people move do need to see and hear things around them.  When are they going to get the idea that people need to be able to chew their food properly?  Maybe they just expect people to gum it!

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