Congressman Peter DeFazio - Health Care Reform

Health Care Reform

Dear Oregonian,

In adopting reforms to the system of providing health care in the United States, Congress and the President should take heed of the adage “First, do no harm”. Many Americans, particularly the 160 million who benefit from employer provided health insurance are happy with their coverage, their chosen doctor and the coverage provided under their plan.

I believe that reform should not be paid for by taxing the benefits of those already covered. They should not force anyone to change plans or providers. Finally, expanded coverage to the uninsured should not add to the ballooning federal deficit.

That said there are serious problems with our existing system. I’ve talked with small business owners who have seen their insurance renewals denied because one employee became sick or was injured. Others have complained about sustained policy price increases or exclusions of existing medical problems. These types of complaints point towards the insurance reform I have been pushing for 20 years; to have the insurance industry play by the same rules as other industries in America. Insurance companies and Major League Baseball are the only two industries exempt from anti-trust laws. That means insurance companies can legally collude to raise prices and exclude individuals from coverage. I have introduced legislation, H.R. 1583, to repeal this exemption. The Consumer Federation of American estimates that repealing the anti-trust exemption could help lower healthcare premiums by 10 percent. While there is room for debate on how we can achieve it, making sure that every American has access to affordable health coverage is now more important than ever.

The House recently introduced the health care reform bill HR 3962Affordable Health Care for America Act. The bill is the combination of 3 different versions of the original health care bill HR 3200. Additionally, the Senate is considering two different proposals of their own. Health care reform is still very much a work in progress. I am pleased that H.R. 3962 contains language I authored. Specifically, it repeals the antitrust exemption enjoyed by the health insurance industry and gives the FTC unambiguous authority to go after the offenders. Applying federal anti-trust law to the industry will provide an important backstop for states and help end anti-competitive, collusive conduct such as price fixing, agreements not to pay, and divvying up the market in non-competitive ways. Repeal of the industry’s anti-trust exemption would effectively end insurance company collusion and bring much-needed competition to the industry. Furthermore, giving the FTC unambiguous authority to investigate these illegal activities would put the insurance industry on notice that these practices will no longer be endured. The bill also contains provisions that I worked on with my colleagues that will fix the longstanding geographic disparities in Medicare reimbursements that has for years hurt Oregonians by giving them lower reimbursements than states like New York or Texas. This means more and more doctors are not accepting new Medicare patients. H.R. 3962 fixes this and will increase reimbursements to doctors in Oregon and lower them in states where they are being overpaid, resulting in a I am encouraged that these much needed changes—changes I have been fighting for—are going to be included in the final House health reform bill, but I am still working through the details of the legislation. I applaud the House leaders for giving Congress and the public more than 72 hours to review the bill and make an informed decision before voting on it. On this page I have included links to the text of the bill itself, the “managers amendment” which includes additional changes, a detailed section by section summary, as well as explanations of other key provisions.