In a one of oh so many mendacious maneuvers to help sell Obamacare, Congress segregated a law needed to keep Medicare docs from suffering a huge pay from the bill in chief, even though it clearly was germane to the legislation that centralized federal control over health care. The purpose for this dishonest maneuver was to cook the financial books, making the behemoth look less expensive overall by removing hundreds of millions in projected expenses over the next decade so the CBO could say, behind a barely contained eye roll, that the bill met fiscal muster.
In fairness, the supporters of this dishonest maneuver thought that the “doctor fix” would quickly pass on its own, since nobody wants to punish doctors who take Medicare. But this is Washington where any dysfunction is possible. Proving the old adage about the plans of mice and men, the doctor fix has not been passed, and doctors are about to have a forced pay cut. From the story:
The worsening budget impasse over Medicare reimbursements is straining not just doctors but also House-Senate relations — with taxpayers facing millions of dollars in added costs for reprocessing claims. Having waited for weeks in hopes of a stay, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, or CMS, is now enforcing a 21 percent cut in physician payments, and an estimated 50 million claims, held back since June 1, will be the first affected.
Medicare itself is a potential loser in the impasse, since the health care program is already troubled by the large number of medical practices that no longer take its elderly patients, given the government’s fee schedule.
June 22nd, 2010 | 10:47 am
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Vince Humphreys, Stand In The Gap. Stand In The Gap said: BIOETHICS WATCH => Obamacare: Sacrificing the Docs http://dlvr.it/1x8f6 #912 #ocra #ucot #rs #tcot #tlot #sgp [...]
June 22nd, 2010 | 11:42 am
It is interesting to note what Canada went through when bringing in Medicare. The first province that brought it in faced a full fledged medical strike. See the story here:
http://youtu.be/pvgAvOaqav8
June 22nd, 2010 | 12:17 pm
“And the entire expense has to be “paid for” by finding other savings, which despite the budget’s bloat, can’t seem to be found. ”
Budget? What budget? Congress apparently has abandoned budgeting.
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
June 22nd, 2010 at 12:22 pm
My wife has a piece on that in today’s SF Chronicle, Steve Colby: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/06/22/EDP81E2JDF.DTL
June 22nd, 2010 | 1:41 pm
The federal budget became meaningless when the previous regime took all Iraq War spending out of the budget in order to promote their myth that you can fight a war without raising taxes. At least this Congress is letting the costs show on the books.
June 22nd, 2010 | 5:59 pm
“from suffering a huge pay CUT” I presume.
June 23rd, 2010 | 10:55 am
This is surreal. Congress is inadvertently going to save money on health care, but due to a legislative impasse, not a deliberate decision.
A 21% cut in Medicare reimbursement will probably cause a lot of docs to *lose* money taking Medicare patients. They’ll probably reinstate the higher reimbursement later, but this may convince some doctors that the Medicare hassle just isn’t worth it.
The whole thing is budget Kabuki. The reduction in rates was originally pushed out into the future to let Congress look responsible without affecting anyone during their careers. Then as the scheduled cuts got closer, they were postponed again and again. The Obamacare bill deliberately left the next scheduled postponement out to get a better CBO score, and now Congress has failed to pass a stand-alone delay in time. What a mess.
Links
Blogs
Find Us
Contact