NEWS RELEASE
Committee on Energy and Commerce Democrats
Congressman John D. Dingell, Ranking Member

CLINTON AND DINGELL INTRODUCE LEGISLATION
TO ROLL BACK BUSH GIVEAWAY TO
INSURANCE COMPANIES

Washington, DC - Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) and Representative John D. Dingell (D-MI) today introduced legislation in both chambers of Congress to roll back a giveaway to HMOs and insurance companies in the budget reconciliation bill that will be signed into law today by President Bush. Senator Clinton and Representative Dingell vowed to introduce the legislation after a news report revealed that Republicans secretly removed measures from the budget reconciliation bill thus allowing HMOs and insurance companies to keep excess payments from Medicare. The Clinton-Dingell bill, the Patients Before Profits Act, also eliminates an unnecessary slush fund established to encourage more insurance companies to participate in the Medicare prescription drug program. The Clinton-Dingell bill would use the funds that would have gone to insurance companies to restore Medicaid funding for much needed medical care for working families, the elderly and people with disabilities slashed and shredded in the new budget law.

"Our bill takes a stand against the misplaced priorities of the Bush Administration and the Republican leadership in Congress. We will stop this giveaway to insurance companies and put this funding back where it is critically needed: providing health care for our most vulnerable," said Senator Clinton.

"Health care for working families took a severe blow in the Republican reconciliation bill. And the President's Budget for Fiscal Year 2007 continues that attack," said Dingell, Ranking Member of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. "Our legislation begins the process of setting things right again, but clearly we have an uphill battle when the President is proposing yet another cut to Medicaid coverage of $17 billion over the next five years."

According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, of the $28 billion in cuts to Medicaid in the bill the President will sign today, about 75 percent is due to provisions that will increase the number of uninsured and under-insured by raising co-payments and premiums, cutting benefits, and tightening access to long-term care. CBO analysis also shows that the reconciliation bill increases the number of uninsured. Twenty percent of the savings from new premium charges under this bill would come from families no longer being able to maintain their Medicaid coverage due to the new charges. Not only would those who today have health insurance coverage under Medicaid lose it, but additional beneficiaries who are eligible for coverage would simply not be able to afford the new premiums and therefore not enroll due to the new premiums. In 2015 alone, there would be 65,000 fewer people enrolled in Medicaid due to new and much higher premiums for low-income populations, and 60 percent of those losing coverage due to new premium charges would be children.

While preserving a windfall of taxpayer dollars to the insurance industry, the budget law that President Bush signed today reduces coverage and increases costs for Medicaid recipients to see their doctors and obtain needed medicines and other benefits. These changes to Medicaid will increase healthcare costs significantly for working families by raising co-payments for medically necessary services like doctors visits, operations, or therapies; reducing access to medicines through restrictive formularies and higher cost-sharing; and increasing out-of-pocket costs for emergency room visits. In addition, the law allows States to provide bare-bones coverage, rather than the appropriate and adequate coverage Medicaid offers today.

The Patients Before Profits Act gives top priority to ensuring affordable and comprehensive health care coverage for millions of American families rather than protecting HMOs who are profiting at the expense of taxpayer dollars. The bill closes a loophole that allows insurance companies to game Medicare payments, eliminating excessive overpayments that the Congressional Budget Office projects would total $22 billion. The bill also eliminates a slush fund that Republicans protected in the closed door conference negotiations that would provide $10 billion over 10 years to encourage Preferred Provider Organizations to participate in the Medicare prescription drug program. The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, the independent group established by Congress to oversee and report on Medicare payments, has called for elimination of both of these unnecessary windfalls for insurance companies.

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