Democrats Spar Among Themselves Over PhRMA Deal

What happened to Tort Reform?

In 1996, Obama said “anyone who doesn’t think there is a crisis in medical malpractice is a trial attorney”.

Fast forward and his ten biggest donors are personal injury attorneys.

There can be no affordable healthcare without tort reform.

They should pass a law saying that drug companies can not charge more in the U.S. than what they charge for the same or equivalent drug in Canada and the E.U. It will be a chore for the FDA to regulate it as different drugs have different approval times in various countries and the companies will try different formulations to get around the reg. but I think it could be made to work.

The Baucus plan increases the cost of healthcare insurrance for everyone except Government employees and those receiving Government aid. Therefore, any penalty imposed for not participating is too much.

The Baucus bill will raise costs to everyone who pays for healthcare themselves. Its these people who cover the cost for everyone else. If this bill goes through, the Democrats are done for. Unless they pass a bill that imposes a tax on people who vote Republican.

And, I’m an independant who voted for Obama.

(full text on //my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/nickkimball/CpZq#extended):

“Remarks for Senator Barack Obama
Roosevelt Middle School
Monday, July 30th, 2007
Cedar Rapids, Iowa
It’s a pleasure to be here today. And it’s also fitting. Because I want to talk with you about an issue that was the life’s work of the man this school is named after.

When Theodore Roosevelt took office over a hundred years ago, he looked out on a country where wealth was becoming more concentrated in the hands of a few robber barons, railroad tycoons and oil magnates.

It was an era known as the Gilded Age, and it was made possible by a government that played along. From the politicians in Washington to the big city machines, it was a system that kept power and money and influence in the hands of the few while working folks found it harder and harder to earn a decent wage or work in a safe environment or get a day off once in awhile.

But Teddy Roosevelt wouldn’t play along. He devoted his presidency to busting trusts, breaking up monopolies, and doing his best to give the American people a shot at the American dream once more.

Over a century later, America needs this kind of leadership more than ever. We need a President who sees government not as a tool to enrich well-connected friends and high-priced lobbyists, but as the defender of fairness and opportunity for every American. That’s what this country has always been about, and that’s the kind of President I intend to be.

We cannot settle for a second Gilded Age in America. But that’s what we’re seeing. We’re seeing a new economy where more wealth is in danger of falling into fewer hands; where the average CEO now earns more in one day than an average worker earns in an entire year; where Americans are struggling like never before to pay their medical bills, or their kids’ tuition, or high gas prices, all while the profits of the drug and insurance and oil industries have never been higher.

And once again, we are faced with a politics that makes all of this possible. In the last six years, our leaders have thrown open the doors of Congress and the White House to an army of Washington lobbyists who have turned our government into a game only they can afford to play – a game played on a field that’s no longer level, but rigged to always favor their own narrow agendas. Year after year after year, they stand in the way of our progress as a country. They stop us from addressing the issues that matter to people most.

Take health care. Over the last decade, the drug and insurance industries spent $1 billion in lobbying. And they got what they paid for – because their friends in Congress broke the rules and twisted arms to push through a prescription drug bill that actually made it illegal for our own government to negotiate with the pharmaceutical companies for cheaper drug prices. As a result, seniors on Medicare here in Iowa are paying 71 percent more for their drugs than veterans who get their prescriptions at the VA, and 47 percent more than those who buy drugs at Canadian pharmacies.

We’ve got to change that. It’s time we had a President who stood up to the drug and insurance industry and said enough is enough. When I am President, I will sign a universal health care bill by the end of my first term in office. It will cover every American, cut the cost of a typical family’s premiums by up to $2,500 a year, and finally make it legal for Medicare to bargain down the price of prescription drugs. We can do that….”

If we’re going to make all these concessions to the drug companies can we, at least, make them do their manufacturing here? At least for the stuff intended for the US market?

Right now, they get 80-90% of their profits from the US market. And they do most of their manufacturing in Europe (to get better terms from their various national health care groups), and Asia (because it’s cheaper there). And they’re starting to outsource their R&D to India. If we’re going to supply the profits, we should at least get the jobs.

As an old lady who still works full time, is eligible for Medicare, and is considered Middle Class, here is my take. I want a prescription drug plan that is fair to both me and the drug companies, but it is not the deal the drug industry proposed to President Obama, The drug companies are running scared but they can offer a better deal if pushed.. For years the Conservatives have told us to let the free markets rule, but if I try to order drugs from Canada, the market does not rule. I am sick of the drug companies so I want my elected officials to worry about me, not them. I am also sick of the health insurance companies. I bought a private policy from Blue Cross/Blue Shield. Paid more per month so that my premium would only increase if the entire group I’m in should increase (which the salesman said would only occur every few years). Well, my premium increased by $50.00 per month each year. I escaped when I went on Medicare. It is time for my elected officials to think about me, not the for profit medical industry. I am truly sick of this. And I am sick of wimpy Democrats who cower before the for profit medical lobby, For God sakes, Democrats, grow a pair!

Medicare should be bargaining for discount prices on all meds; if prescription drugs cost half as much, most people would not get into the doughnut hole in the first place. And drugs imported from Canada should be legal for people who want to buy them. The ban is a giveaway to the drugmakers, not a safety issue to protect the consumer. Obama’s deal with big pharma- a loser for the average citizen.

I don’t feel that my Senators are responsible for any deal the executive office stuck with the drug industry. They knew that when they made the backroom deal with one branch of the government. I want my Senators to get the best deal available. Foreign government programs pay far less than we do for many drugs. It is time this playing field gets leveled and Americans gain access to the same drugs at the same prices as citizens of other countries. No more going to Canada or Mexico or France for cheaper drugs. They need to be cheaper right here in America.

To all those who say we need to pay these high prices so new drugs can be developed I say you are wrong. Pfizer has had excess billions for over a decade from Lipitor profits and they have come up with nothing new. That model doesn’t work. We need to finance new drugs another way.

JW Morrison: If you’re so mad, why don’t you do something like see your US Senators and US Representative?

This is the problem with people. They get upset and then expect someone else to fix it.

Enough subsidizing insurance companies and drug companies.

Pass single payer or some compromise that provides robust competition and buys all drugs at big discounts.

And someone please remind the right wing that people are people– no matter your legal status. If you need health care in Mexico, in Europe or anywhere else, you get it.

Exactly what fake line in the sand are you drawing when you say “No health care for illegals?” Do you think a doctor should refuse to treat someone because they don’t have ID?

That sounds like a definition of hell to me, putting a caretaker in that position.

Of course, when the pie is getting sliced thinner and thinner, it is easier to look at someone poorer and more powerless than you. Mad at your boss, kick the dog.

Corporate health care taking more and more from your wallet? Well — let’s just shut down THOSE illegals.

This kind of thinking is a race to the bottom based on the false premise that there isn’t enough to go around. There is enough to go around, and then some.

The current health care is brutal and profit driven.

It should simply be a human right to get care when you need it. And the earlier the better. Stop using the ER as a first aid station and save billions.

This doctor’s thoughts on health care reform make sense to me:

1. Remove health insurers’ tort immunity. A 1974 law called the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) governs employee benefits in the United States. An infamous clause in that law referred to as “pre-emption” removes any state law jurisdiction from services covered under ERISA, such as health, life and disability insurance. Consequently, insurers in these areas are almost entirely immunized from any state regulatory practices. Lawsuits can still be filed in Federal court, but Federal regulatory laws are utterly inadequate and punitive damages are unavailable. Thus, a bill designed to codify and protect workers’ benefits became the largest abrogation of civil liability law in American history. Needless to say, SCOTUS has interpreted these protections for corporations exceedingly broadly.

This protection from lawsuits can be cancelled in two ways. One, Congress could simply cancel the pre-emption clause in ERISA, opening up insurers to liability under state consumer protection laws again. This could easily find its way into “medical malpractice reform” being discussed in Congress under the health care bill now. Two, Congress could institute national consumer protections under which insurers could be sued in Federal courts. The first option is much easier, and has the advantage that suits in state courts tend to be far cheaper and quicker. The second would protect people nationwide, and would avoid the phenomenon of insurers picking off state legislatures one by one. Battle cry: Kill off the private insurance death panels.

2. Cancel the insurers’ anti-trust exemption. A new bill introduced by John Conyers and Pat Leahy, which would end insurance company exemption from anti-trust enforcement (originally granted by the McCarran-Ferguson Act of 1945.) This is critical, because insurance company collusion called “market allocation” has allowed them to divide up state markets so that most of them have only one or two dominant insurers in the market. This plainly anti-competitive practice violates the essence of anti-trust laws, but has been made legal. It should be made illegal. Battle cry: If the opponents of reform insist that competition among private insurers will fix health care, let’s give it to them.

3. Make health insurers spend our premiums on health care. The medical loss ratio is the proportion of health insurance company revenue that is spent on providing health care. It may be regulated by states, which tend to favor this regulatory mechanism because it is easy to measure and administer. Wall Street also closely watches medical loss ratios, and a company’s stock price depends heavily upon it. Wendell Potter described, in testimony to Congress, how this works for insurance company executives and their customers (see heading 2.) In 2005, medical loss ratios for six of the largest health insurers ranged from 77 – 84%. Ten years earlier, they were in the high 80’s or 90’s. By contrast, Medicare’s administrative costs are reported by the government as 3.6% (though conservative critics often cite 5-6%) and costs under Canada’s single-payer program are 1.3% (same link). By contrast, the Bush administration’s effort to privatize Medicare called Medicare Advantage pays between 12 – 17% more than standard Medicare rates to private insurers to administer a Medicare-plus program. The pluses are sometimes substantial, sometimes illusory.

An essential feature of reform, both to further cost containment and health insurance regulation, is to limit the money health insurers skim off the top. I would propose that any private health insurer taking Federal funds maintain a medical loss ratio of at least 90%, rising to 96% over ten years. 96% corresponds to the Medicare administrative overhead, which is slated to diminish in upcoming years as Medicare outlays increase. Any ownership interest in qualifying companies by non-qualifying insurers would have to be prohibited, to stop the shell company scam. If private insurers are going to finance care, why should we accept greater inefficiency than government shows? Battle cry: Spend health care money on health care.

4. Give all government sponsored health insurance programs access to the VA drug formulary. The VA Health System drug formulary is the main source of prescription coverage for veterans using the VA. It covers many commonly used drugs in all drug classes, but not all of them. By negotiating aggressively on price, the VA can buy drugs at prices that compare with Canadian provincial systems, which are much lower than other sources in the US. While any provider or patient in the VA system will complain about the drug formulary, it provides the most benefit for the least cost of any drug program in America.

Dramatic cost savings could be achieved by allowing participating insurers meeting government guidelines to buy drugs from the VA or at VA prices. While the VA makes its formulary mandatory with defined exceptions, other buyers would not have to follow their practice. This would strongly incentivize drug manufacturers to compete with each other on price to get on the formulary, and it would further strengthen the VA’s bargaining position to get even lower prices. This measure would obviously cancel the White House’s agreement with PhRMA not to negotiate on price, but let’s remember that Congress is not bound by that agreement. Battle cry: Let’s get the best value we can.

To that I say AMEN.

Confiscate the drug companies. Confiscate the insurance companies. For free quality health care for all. Confiscate the banks, finance companies, and credit card companies. Cancel the debts. For a Workers’ Party to fight for a workers’ government that would expropriate, without compensation, all major industry, banking, communication, transportation. For a socialist America. Then there’ll be some real justice, not this gang of right-wing Demopublican-Republicrat representatives jointly administering the capitalist plutocracy masquerading as a “democracy” under which we all live.

–Allan Greene
Email: tompaine1917@yahoo.com

The Obama administration is selling us out if the interests of the pharmaceutical industry are placed before those of our (mostly elderly) citizens. No deals should be made with Pharma — this is an industry that has been spending millions every year to persuade doctors to use its products and passing the cost on to the consumer. Force Pharma to truly benefit society. Those companies will still turn a huge profit, but Americans will receive the healthcare they need in the process.