[Vision2020] House Passes Drug Cost Bill

[Tom Hansen]

>From Today's (January 11, 2007) -

"Supporters argue that the massive scale of the Medicare program would
result in more significant discounts for prescriptions than private insurers
are able to obtain."

Representative Bill Sali, who continues to be inaccessible to the citizens
of Idaho from his website at http://sali.house.gov/, voted against this
bill.

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House passes drug cost bill 
It requires officials to seek discounts; veto promised

Johanna Neuman 
Los Angeles Times
January 13, 2007

WASHINGTON - Defying a threatened presidential veto, the U.S. House of
Representatives on Friday approved a bill to require federal officials to
negotiate with drug companies for lower prices for the 23 million senior
citizens who have signed up for Medicare's prescription drug coverage.

Although the bill is unlikely to become law, it is likely to shape the
debate that could result in a more limited measure that allows some
negotiating between the government and the pharmaceutical industry over drug
costs.
 
Supporters argue that the massive scale of the Medicare program would result
in more significant discounts for prescriptions than private insurers are
able to obtain.

At the least, the House bill signals a shift in Washington from President
Bush's view that private enterprise and individual citizens should play the
most prominent role in the decisions that determine health-care costs.

The legislation passed 255 to 170 vote, with 24 Republicans joining 231
Democrats in backing it. All those voting against it were Republicans.

The bill would repeal a ban on letting the government negotiate with
manufacturers for lower prices - a provision that was part of the
GOP-sponsored 2003 measure that created the prescription drug program. Under
the House bill, the secretary of the Health and Human Services department
would be empowered to seek the best prices for the prescription drugs used
by Medicare participants.

House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer, D-Md., hailed the bill as "a very
important first step in making prescription drugs more affordable."

The legislation - one of the measures that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi,
D-Calif., promised Democrats would enact within the first 100 working hours
after taking control of the House - was strongly opposed by pharmaceutical
companies. Several bought full-page ads in newspapers, urging Congress not
to tinker with the drug benefit.

The White House has sided with the pharmaceutical industry's argument and
aides have pledged that Bush would veto the bill if it reached his desk.

"We have a Medicare prescription drug reform that has been saving people
significant amounts of money; it is effective," White House press secretary
Tony Snow said Friday. "If this bill is presented to the president, he will
veto it."

The bill's chances in the Senate appear slim.

Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., has said he would not embrace
the House proposal; instead, he favors a bill that would allow - rather than
order - the administration to haggle with pharmaceutical companies over drug
prices.

And the committee's ranking Republican, Chuck Grassley of Iowa, warned that
the House bill could "block access to drugs that a senior might need, make
it harder to get your medicine at the local pharmacy, and result in higher
drug prices for younger people."

But Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, made clear she plans to push for some
version of the House bill.

"Now is the time for the Senate . . . to harness the buying power of
millions of seniors to give them a better value for their health-care
dollar," she said.

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Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"Forty percent of the mass of every tree in the forest is crude oil.  Stop
and think about that.  We call them fossil fuels because they used to be
live stuff . . . now in the ground is turned into crude oil." 

- Bill Sali (September 21, 2006)