Under ObamaCare, Democrats Make Government Your Doctor

August 23, 2012

Obama Himself Said That He Wanted Government Bureaucrats in Charge of “Assessing and Evaluating Treatment Options,” and IPAB is How He Plans to Do It

When Democrats rammed through ObamaCare, they also put a board of unelected bureaucrats in charge of medical decisions normally left to patients and their doctors, with devastating consequences for seniors who rely on Medicare.
This board of Medicare cutters will give Washington bureaucrats unprecedented influence over your personal medical decisions, and President Obama admitted in a 2009 interview that this was the Democrats’ plan all along.
Democrats want to make government your doctor, but America’s real doctors are urging repeal of the Democrats’ board of Medicare-cutters.

When Democrats rammed through ObamaCare, they also put a board of unelected bureaucrats in charge of medical decisions normally left to patients and their doctors, with devastating consequences for seniors who rely on Medicare:

“OBAMA BUDGET WANTS MORE TEETH” FOR MEDICARE-GUTTING BOARD: (Phillip Klein, “Obama Budget Wants More Teeth for Medicare Board,” The Washington Examiner, 2/13/2012)

DEMOCRATS EMPOWERED “15 SAGES” WITH “THE POWER OF THE PURSE” TO GUT MEDICARE: (Editorial Board, “The Presidential Divider,”The Wall Street Journal, 4/14/2011)

WSJ: OBAMA MEDICARE PLAN IS MEDICARE “RATIONING,” WILL “THROW GRANNY OVER THE CLIFF”: “One place to start is by attacking the Democratic plan to cut Medicare via political rationing. Mr. Ryan’s budget had the virtue of embarrassing President Obama’s spend-more initial budget, and the White House responded by proposing to increase the power of the new Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) to decide what, and how much, Medicare will pay for. The ObamaCare bill goes to great lengths to shelter this 15-member, unelected board from Congressional review, with the goal of letting these bureaucrats throw granny over the cliff if Medicare isn’t reformed. Yet few Americans know anything about IPAB or its rationing intentions.” (Editorial, “The GOP’s New York Spanking,” The Wall Street Journal, 5/26/2011)

IPAB MEMBERS CAN SERVE UP TO TWELVE YEARS, OR TWO SIX YEAR TERMS, WITHOUT EVER FACING VOTERS: “Terms are for six years, and members may serve no more than two consecutive terms.” (Jack Ebeler, Tricia Neuman, and Juliette Cubanski, “The Independent Payment Advisory Board: A New Approach to Controlling Medicare Spending,” The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, April 2011)

NOT A DOCTOR? DON’T WORRY ABOUT IT: “The appointment membership of the board shall include (but shall not be limited to) physicians and other health professionals, experts in the area of pharmaco-economics or prescription drug benefit programs, employers, third-party payers, individuals skilled in the conduct and interpretation of biomedical, health services, and health economics research and expertise in outcomes and effectiveness research and technology assessment. Such membership shall also include representatives of consumers and the elderly.” (p. 402, “Sec.3403. Independent [Medicare] Payment Advisory Board,” Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, 5/3/2010)

DOCTORS NOT EVEN ALLOWED TO BE THE MAJORITY OF THE BOARD: “(iii) MAJORITY NONPROVIDERS.—Individuals who are directly involved in the provision or management of the delivery of items and services covered under this title shall not constitute a majority of the appointed membership of the Board.” (p. 423, Compilation of Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, 6/09/2010)

DEMOCRATS CUT MORE THAN $700 BILLION FROM MEDICARE TO PAY FOR OBAMACARE:(Douglas Elmendorf, “Letter to the Honorable John Boehner,”Congressional Budget Office, 7/24/2012)

This board of Medicare cutters will give Washington bureaucrats unprecedented influence over your personal medical decisions, and President Obama admitted in a 2009 interview that this was the Democrats’ plan all along:

OBAMA IN 2009: GOVERNMENT SHOULD BE “ASSESSING AND EVALUATING TREATMENT OPTIONS,” ESPECIALLY “WHEN IT COMES TO MEDICARE AND MEDICAID”: “And part of what I think government can do effectively is to be an honest broker in assessing and evaluating treatment options. And certainly that’s true when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid, where the taxpayers are footing the bill and we have an obligation to get those costs under control.” (David Leonhardt, “After the Great Recession,” The New York Times, 4/28/2009)

“IT IS AN ATTEMPT TO SAY TO PATIENTS,” FACING A CHOICE BETWEEN A “RED PILL” AND A “BLUE PILL,” “YOU MIGHT WANT TO GO AHEAD AND GET THE BLUE ONE”: “So when Peter Orszag and I talk about the importance of using comparative-effectiveness studies (9) as a way of reining in costs, that’s not an attempt to micromanage the doctor-patient relationship. It is an attempt to say to patients, you know what, we’ve looked at some objective studies out here, people who know about this stuff, concluding that the blue pill, which costs half as much as the red pill, is just as effective, and you might want to go ahead and get the blue one. And if a provider is pushing the red one on you, then you should at least ask some important questions.” (David Leonhardt, “After the Great Recession,” The New York Times, 4/28/2009)

OBAMA MUSED ABOUT WHETHER IT WAS “A SUSTAINABLE MODEL” FOR HIS OWN AGING GRANDMOTHER TO HAVE HAD A HIP REPLACEMENT: “I don’t know how much that hip replacement cost. I would have paid out of pocket for that hip replacement just because she’s my grandmother. Whether, sort of in the aggregate, society making those decisions to give my grandmother, or everybody else’s aging grandparents or parents, a hip replacement when they’re terminally ill is a sustainable model, is a very difficult question.” (David Leonhardt, “After the Great Recession,” The New York Times, 4/28/2009)

Democrats want to make government your doctor, but America’s real doctors are urging repeal of the Democrats’ board of Medicare-cutters:

90% OF HOUSE DEMS VOTED AGAINST REPEALING IPAB:(Roll Call 126, Clerk of the U.S. House, 3/22/2012)

AMERICAN UROLOGICAL ASSOCIATION: DOCTORS WILL “OPT OUT OF THE MEDICARE PROGRAM OR BE DRIVEN OUT OF PRACTICE ALTOGETHER”: “He warned, ‘These cuts could be driven so low that physicians will be forced to limit the number of Medicare beneficiaries they see, opt out of the Medicare program, or be driven out of practice altogether.’” (Ralph Lindeman, “IPAB Would Reduce Access to Care, Witnesses Tell Ways and Means Panel,” Bloomberg, 3/7/2012)

DOCTOR AND PATIENT GROUPS: IPAB’S CUTS “WOULD LEAD TO A REDUCTION IN ACCESS TO CARE”: “The Independent Payment Advisory Board, created under the health care law to help control Medicare costs, lacks flexibility to do much more than cut provider payments that would lead to a reduction in access to care, witnesses told a House Ways and Means panel March 6.” (Ralph Lindeman, “IPAB Would Reduce Access to Care, Witnesses Tell Ways and Means Panel,” Bloomberg, 3/7/2012)

41 DOCTORS’ GROUPS REPRESENTING 400,000 DOCTORS FEAR THAT “15 UNELECTED AND LARGELY UNACCOUNTABLE” BUREAUCRATS WILL MAKE MEDICARE DECISIONS, AND NONE ARE ALLOWED TO BE “PRACTICING PHYSICIANS”: “With the advent of the IPAB, however, the people’s elected representatives will no longer have power over Medicare payment policy. Instead, these major health policy decisions will rest in the hands of 15 unelected and largely unaccountable individuals. Even worse, if IPAB fails to report recommendations or never becomes operational, this power will rest solely in the hands of a single individual – the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Additionally, fewer than half of the IPAB members can be health care providers, and none are permitted to be practicing physicians or be otherwise employed.”(Letter from Healthcare Stakeholders, House Energy and Commerce Committee, 3/5/2012)

AMERICAN OSTEOPATHIC ASSOCIATION: CONCERNS THAT “QUALITY CARE FOR OUR PARENTS WILL BE JEOPARDIZED”: “We are concerned that, by removing Congressional authority over the Medicare payment system and placing such unprecedented authority in an unelected body, quality care for our patients will be jeopardized. We are equally concerned with the potential that physicians may be subjected to a double jeopardy in Medicare payments if IPAB cuts are coupled with those projected under the current sustainable growth rate (SGR). The current instability and inequities in Medicare physician payments is hindering access to care for millions of Medicare beneficiaries. IPAB would only exacerbate this problem.” (Martin S. Levine, American Osteopathic Association, Letter to House Energy & Commerce Committee, 2/28/2012)

AMERICAN COLLEGE OF SURGEONS, WITH 75,000 MEMBERS, CALLS FOR IPAB REPEAL:(David B. Hoyt, Letter to Joe Pitts, House Energy and Committee, 2/28/2012)

IPAB WILL “NEGATIVELY IMPACT THE AVAILABILITY OF QUALITY, EFFICIENT HEALTH CARE”: “The Committee’s consideration of H.R. 452 is an important step in preserving Congress’ role in Medicare payment policy. Leaving payment policy decisions in the hands of an unelected, unaccountable governmental body with minimal congressional oversight will negatively impact the availability of quality, efficient health care to Medicare beneficiaries and all Americans.”(David B. Hoyt, Letter to Joe Pitts, House Energy and Committee, 2/28/2012)

12,000 DOCTORS OF AMERICAN PODIATRIC MEDICAL ASSOCIATION: IPAB WILL “SEVERELY LIMIT MEDICARE BENEFICIARIES’ ACCESS TO CARE” AND “INCREASE HEALTH-CARE COSTS”: “[Our] members believe that the ill-conceived Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) contained in the Affordable Care Act will not only severely limit Medicare beneficiaries’ access to care but also increase health-care costs that are shifted onto the private sector.”(Michael J. King, American Podiatric Medical Association,” Letter to House Energy & Commerce Committee, 2/28/2012)

Under ObamaCare, Democrats Make Government Your Doctor http://ow.ly/da27w#iwantrepeal