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Waxman urges supercommittee to leave Medicaid and Medicare alone, extend drug rebates
The top Democrat on the Energy and Commerce panel wants the deficit-cutting supercommittee to leave Medicare and Medicaid untouched and instead save money by extending drug rebates, according to a draft letter obtained by The Hill.
House and Senate committees have until Friday to share their priorities with the supercommittee. The draft letter from Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) is being circulated among Democrats to get their input and has yet to be formally sent.
"These views have been shared with the Democratic members of the Committee and reflect valuable input from the members," the letter states.
The letter says Congress has already cut billions of dollars in spending, so "the majority" of the supercommittee's deficit reduction "should be composed of revenues to balance the spending cuts already enacted."
Waxman's letter goes on to argue that the healthcare reform law made profound changes to the Medicare program to keep it solvent, so it would be "premature" for the supercommittee to make further changes before they're implemented and "irresponsible" to cut public programs when "there are deep concerns regarding healthcare cost increases in the private sector."
The letter then goes through a usual list of liberal demands:
• Extend Medicaid drug rebates to cover low-income people on Medicare (saves $135 billion over 10 years);
• Restrict so-called "pay-for-delay" deals between brand-name drugmakers and generic manufacturers (saves $3 billion);
• Root our waste, fraud and abuse.
The letter also urges the supercommittee to preserve the health law's investments in prevention and calls for any health savings to go toward repealing the Medicare physician payment system.
The supercommittee should "not pursue policies that would undermine coverage for Medicare, Medicaid, or people who will enroll in health insurance through exchanges," the letter states, and "must resist the temptation to reduce federal health care costs by passing these costs to other payers who are even less able to afford them."
Read the letter below:
