Senators Tackle $1T Health Care Challenge

Democrats Expected To Scale Back Plans As Health, Finance Committees Wrestle With Overhaul Cost Estimates

(CBS/AP)  Eye-popping new cost estimates for President Obama's plan to overhaul the U.S. health care system are forcing majority Democrats to scale back their plans to subsidize coverage for the uninsured.

The $1 trillion-plus estimates come as the Senate Health Committee prepares to meet Wednesday to begin crafting a bill around Mr. Obama's top legislative priority.

Big holes remain to be filled on the most controversial issues in the health care bill authored by the committee's chairman, Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass.: a new public insurance plan to compete with the private market, and whether employers must provide health care for their workers.

Kennedy is suffering from brain cancer and was not expected to be present. But his deputy on health care, Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., said the committee would move forward anyway with a session to finalize and vote on a bill he said would provide "successful, affordable, quality health care."

The committee was scheduled to meet daily through next week.

Disagreements over costs and other issues hung up another key committee, the Senate Finance Committee, which has a more moderate makeup than Kennedy's panel and is considered Congress' best hope for producing a bipartisan bill.

The Finance Committee was supposed to produce a draft bill Wednesday. But Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., said that wouldn't happen and the bill would come out "when it's ready" - later this week or next. The Finance Committee was supposed to start voting next week.

Majority Democrats in the House could unveil their bill later this week, with committee votes after Congress returns from its July 4 recess.

Negotiations were roiled Monday by an analysis from the Congressional Budget Office that said Kennedy's bill would cost about $1 trillion over 10 years but leave 37 million people uninsured, compared with 50 million who are uninsured now.

Democrats called the numbers inconclusive, reported CBS News correspondent Wyatt Andrews, and even the CBO called its own report incomplete. But the sheer magnitude of what Congress is considering is undeniable.

"The news yesterday from the CBO is a turning point in the health-care debate," said Rep. Eric Cantor.

Also on Tuesday, a cost estimate for the Finance Committee bill became public: $1.6 trillion. Senators quickly huddled on ways to bring down costs, with Baucus insisting the final price tag on the Finance Committee bill would be around $1 trillion.

At the Senate Health panel, officials said that after penciling in subsidies for families with incomes as high as $110,000, or 500 percent of the federal poverty level, they would limit the help to families up to $88,000 in income, or 400 percent of the poverty level.

The emerging Finance Committee bill also cuts off subsidies to help people buy insurance at 400 percent of the poverty level, but Baucus told reporters a reduction was "a live option." There were indications the final cutoff would be closer to 300 percent of poverty - $66,000 for a four-person family.

Major cuts in Medicare and Medicaid will pay for some of the new costs but senators disagreed among themselves over whether to tax employer-provided health benefits - something Mr. Obama campaigned against.

Andrews reported that Mr. Obama believes he can raise $267 billion to partly fund the program by limiting tax deductions for high income wage earners, but the reality is that most of Congress opposes the idea.

"And if they're unwilling to do that, they're going to have to pick an option that has other political difficulties," Jonathan Oberlander, an associate professor of Social Medicine at University of North Carolina, told CBS News. "So the question is which kind of poison do they want to drink."

Also elusive was a compromise with Republicans on a new public insurance plan, which the GOP opposes.

The emerging bills envision a new insurance market "exchange" where people could go to shop for insurance coverage, helped by federal subsidies. Individuals will almost certainly be required to obtain coverage.

Business groups were working overtime to soften any requirement for employers to provide coverage for their employees or face fines. Most large employers already offer health care, but senators are looking at requiring certain levels of care, so businesses fear a scenario in which the government would force them to offer more or different coverage than they already do.

"We're concerned that the plan requirements will be so robust that our members' plans won't meet those requirements," said Jeri Kubicki, the National Association of Manufacturers' vice president for human resources policy.

Also Wednesday, four former Senate leaders - Democrats Tom Daschle and George Mitchell and Republicans Bob Dole and Howard Baker - were releasing a $1.2 trillion proposal that would cover everyone and be fully paid for with a combination of spending cuts and tax increases.

[vrknoise]

Don't let those dag-burn libruls take ur munny!! That's all they want to do is take your hard urnd munny!! And they dance with illegal mexicans and shake hands with the muzlimz. It's crime. All the democrats are going to take our gunz, knives, lives, wimmin, huntn&fishn, beer, trucks, hard urnd munny and they're going to give it right to the devil himself and sell all our souls to be damned to hellfire oblivion!!! Democrats hate America. They want to turn our country into nazi germans. We'll all be speaking germanese at the end of Obama's reign of terror - which will be never because he's our dictator now! Republicans love America and know that corporate profit is the only way to a healthy society. Republicans do a better job because they know that the government sucks at everything, which is why they don't do anything which is why they love America. Also, flag pin!!

"I'm Sarah Palin. I'm totally insane and I approve this message"

[DeborahCalvert]

Why don't you Senators demand the refund of tens of millions of dollars overpaid to large skilled nursing facilities like Sun Healthcare Group Inc. -see article below

Potentially inappropriate nursing home payments spur increased Medicare Part A, Part D oversight
June 08, 2009
Tens of millions of dollars were likely inappropriately paid to skilled nursing facilities through the Medicare Part D prescription drug program in 2006, according to a recently released report from the Department of Health and Human Services Office of the Inspector General.
According to the OIG report, Part D spent roughly $41 million that year to pay for drugs for nursing home residents who should have been covered under the Medicare Part A benefit. While admitting that a small number of facilities constituted the vast majority of inappropriate payments-30 long-term care pharmacies were responsible for 18% of the payments-investigators say that nearly every SNF and half of all pharmacies have at least one Part A patient inappropriately receiving Part D subsidized prescriptions.
In response to the oversight, the OIG made a series of recommendations to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, which include more oversight and guidance for skilled nursing facilities. Specifically, OIG told CMS to implement retrospective reviews to prevent future inappropriate payments, and to further educate facilities, pharmacies and drug plans about which Medicare plan is responsible for which medication repayment.

[DeborahCalvert]

Scaleback plans when what we have isn't working? This was my experience: Sun Healthcare Group Inc's Sunbridge Newport in Calif, where my mother was harmed by known broken equipment they even refused to repair while commited to a California state injunction. Even the Dept of Justice turned a blind eye. My mother suffered a horrific death, when a stroke SUN caused she lost her ability to swallow for the remainder of her life. She caught MRSA from the facility in the end and it compromised her already weakened system and she died. Then I was cheated in mediation, when they fooled me. I filed malpractice against my attorney, Daniel Leipold, for neglecting to file proper damages (duh!) for wrongful death, elder abuse and pain & suffering -- then he died 2 weeks later. I won. but SUN cheated California taxpayers out of millions of dollars in fines the injunction would have cost them had the DOJ done their job, (Claude Vanderwold, Asst. Attorney General, told me and my attorney this Sunbridge's wrongdoing was NOT included in their $2.5 Million fine the DOJ fined SUN for in Sept 2005 for "California facilities' violations. They "missed" it, sorry). And the Dept of Health in Orange County did not fine the normal $100,000 for her death. Yet I provided the medical report from SUN's medical director, Dr L Scott Stoney, confirming the broken equipment killed my mother. Dr Stoney even quit over the lack of response to repair broken equipment by SUN's top management. They make profits for their shareholders but at the cost of elder abuse and manslaughter.
Do we really want this to continue in America?

[vista8635]

On healthcare most Americans are Pro-Affordable, not Pro-Profit!

Deny the GOP's health care claim. Stop government by the corporations, for the corporations. There are four health care lobbyists for each member of congress, and they must be stopped.

[sjc_1]

"6 years ago, what happened?"

Dole, Gingrich and the insurance industry with their $100 million for Harry and Louise ads is what happened. They started a campaign of fear mongering that worked and was used over and over by Bush and his cronies for everything from WMD to illegal wire taps.

[sjc_1]

So called "Tort Reform" is nothing more than letting bad doctors off the hook for the wrong that they have done, it becomes just a cost of doing bad business. Court awards total less than 1% of the national health care costs. A bad doctor, hospital or other care providers can kill, cripple or seriously injure someone for life and have to be held accountable for the damage that they have done.

[chamade-2009]

I should have mentioned, here in Texas, we've already gone through Tort Reform to lower health care costs. Ha ha ha! The limits on financial awards are capped seriously, and we've had these reforms for several years. But we're still paying more insurance for less services. Our copays go up, our prescription costs go up and the promise of lower costs was just that, empty promises by doctors and insurance companies dying for us to go for the reform, just like the wheelers who told us electricity deregulation was a good thing. When will we learn? Tort reforms haven't solved the high cost of health care in Texas, and now Obama's courting Tort Reforms as a means of talking the insurance industry into going for health care. Sure Obama, go for it, they'll eat it up with even more promises of lower cost care. They'll NEVER deliver on the promise, but they'll be delighted to lower the cost of liability insurance for it's medical provider members. You can't see the forest for the trees.

[chamade-2009]

I'm just amazed. Nobody questions where the $1.9B war funding is going to come from, and nobody balks at spending hundreds of billions rebuilding Iraq. But health care for the U.S. is a puzzle requiring tax hikes on it's citizens? Come on! Here's a thought, get Iraq to pay us back for the improvements we've made, sell the military equipment we'll never get back to Iraq or Afghanistan, and take the war funding and spend it on health care. Let's worry about oppression elsewhere when we've solved oppression here at home.

[cdegolier]

by woeisme1 June 17, 2009 1:56 PM PDT
No is forcing any of you no idea repukelicons to take the plan. So **** already. Gallows politics!


No one is forcing us to take the government run plan, just forcing us to pay for it. The government has not been very successful at running anything no matter who is president. Look at Medicare, Social Security both are running out of money and you want the government to run health care. Yeah, that's a great idea, um 1 trillion to cover 13 million people, really now are these people illegal or actual citizens?

[cdegolier]

"Negotiations were roiled Monday by an analysis from the Congressional Budget Office that said Kennedy's bill would cost about $1 trillion over 10 years but leave 37 million people uninsured, compared with 50 million who are uninsured now."

So they are saying it will cost 1 trillion to cover 13 million people over ten years. Why not set up a health care bank account for all 50 million uninsured and put 1 million in each account, only to be spent on health care, once the money is gone you are on your own.

[specialty8]

If you pay for your own right now be prepared, you will also be paying for somebody else.

[zonkzilla]

The US is the only non third world country, with the exception of Communist China, that does not offer healthcare to all of its citizens.
It is time for the US to get out off the lists of other third world countries like Sudan and Somalia on this important issue.
Knowing a lot about Germany and their healthcare system, to say the US is the best in the world is not only arrogant, it is totally ignorant.
The German hospitals I visited and the procedures and equipment used made most US hospitals look obsolete and pathetic.

[venkata4--2008]

by NEWCO123 June 17, 2009 12:50 PM PDT

Republicans would not allow any means to offer government health care plans to anybody, even to under privileged. In the election campaign Mr. McCain promised upto a maximum $5000 tax break to pay for health care premiums. Do republicans have any faintest idea as to how much health care premiums cost per year per family.

Why 76% of the pharmaceutical industry profits are from 5% of the world population? Do figures add up?

16 - 17 years ago Clinton plans might have failed, that does not mean that we should not try one more time.

BTW I do not have 700 billions to bail out AIG and other big banks. I do know all top executives pay federal income tax @ 45% almost double than me. At the same time all those top executives can pay their own health care cost from their pocket. Not average American.

[venkata4--2008]

"'The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help.' - Ronald Reagan"

Interesting, why big corporations and banks went to government with a huge begging bowl then? AIG got 150 billions of the bail out right? If government is not there to help, they could have gone where ?

[venkata4--2008]

This plan costs $ 1 trillion over next 10 years. Unjust, totally unwarranted Iraq war is cost us more than that per year. And that war funded totally by borrowing. Thanks to Bush administration and also his tax cuts of $135 billions to richest.

Now for funding for this health insurance, roll back tax cuts to richest and also introduce national sales tax of 2% which everybody has to pay. I know it is a very bitter pill to swallow but I am against republican way of barrow and spend.

Republican president Bush vetoed SCHIP 2 times & singed Iraq war spending bill in a swish. And guess who benefited from the war? Big energy companies, defense suppliers.

[sjc_1]

"..ruse to refinance Medicare/Medicaid"

After years of optional National Health Insurance, you may have millions of people in the program under the age of 50 paying premiums and not filing claims. If the profits from all of that can pay for some Medicare, that is a good thing. It means lower taxes and lower costs.

[ubrew12]

This could be so easy:
Go to single payer and save $400 billion in administrative costs immediately, so the switch MORE than pays for itself.

Canada has single payer: they get BETTER healthcare than we do (according to the World Health Organization) and pay HALF what we do to get it.

That's why just about EVERY trading partner we have has gone to single payer. While we're still trying to figure out how to make a private insurance scheme reasonably priced, and it overcharges for healthcare to the tune of trillions of dollars, and leaves 50 million Americans uninsured.

The rightwingers on this board suggesting that this is the best of all possible systems should be ashamed of themselves. This system KILLS people, and they are helping.

[woeisme1]

The rightwingers on this board suggesting that this is the best of all possible systems should be ashamed of themselves. This system KILLS people, and they are helping.
========================

And the neo-con party continues to crumble....LMAO!!

[gravyboat3000]

by dg441-2009 June 17, 2009 8:20 AM PDT
Quit giving free health care services to prisoners. They get three meals a day, a place to live and free health care thanks to us hard working taxpayers.
_____
Yes, we've already tortured prisoners, why not refuse basic healthcare to ALL inmates?

Then, they'll spread all kinds of diseases, that Americans will be exposed to. Wait, we could just throw 'em in a big pit! NO! Death penalty for parking tickets!

Kill 'em all, let the great spirit in the sky sort 'em out...

[dg441-2009]

Quit giving free health care services to prisoners. They get three meals a day, a place to live and free health care thanks to us hard working taxpayers.

[gravyboat3000]

Insurance company lobbyists, and Politicians from both sides who get ,"kickbacks", from Insurancee companies will kill ANY meaningful Healthcare legislation.