The Health Care Reform Corner – From the editors of "The Pink Sheet" - August 2009
What are policymakers and stakeholders in Washington saying and doing about health care reform? In this periodic BioPharma Today feature, the editors of "The Pink Sheet" and "The Pink Sheet" DAILY highlight some of the major developments chronicled in those publications.
Read today's features...
WASINGTON, D.C. – The House health care reform bill passed by the Energy and Commerce Committee July 31 directs HHS to negotiate drug prices directly with manufacturers for the Medicare Part D program, but it does not authorize HHS to establish a national formulary. That leaves the provision vulnerable to being stripped out as the bill proceeds through Congress, on the basis that it may not reduce costs. Read the story here…
The House Energy and Commerce Committee’s reform bill also does not include a provision establishing a new executive branch agency to guide Medicare payment policy and reform - despite earlier statements from committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., indicating it would.
Waxman said July 22 that committee leaders had agreed "in concept" to incorporate in the bill an Independent Medicare Advisory Council "that will drive a cost control regime in Medicare." The idea originated in the Obama administration, which forwarded a legislative proposal describing IMAC to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi July 17. Read the story here…
The House reform bill’s sunshine provisions have been revised to incorporate federal pre-emption of state laws that require the same type of disclosure reports. The bill requires electronic reports to HHS on any payments or gifts to physicians or other health care entities by manufacturers or distributors of drugs and biologics covered under Medicare, Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program. The legislation also requires hospitals and health care facilities that bill HHS for services to report on ownership of shares by each physician who owns an interest in their facilities. Read the story here…
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality is planning to spend $173 million of the $300 million allocated to it for comparative effectiveness research by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act on evidence generation.
"This proposal ... is intended to establish a coordinated national investment in practical/pragmatic comparative effectiveness research that is focused on important research questions for the health care system and its users with a concentration in under-represented populations," AHRQ said in a report delivered to Congress July 30. Read the story here…
- Scott Steinke
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