Second Opinion

Floor Speech

Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I come to the floor, as I have week after week since the health care bill was signed into law, with a doctor's second opinion about the health care law because the President repeatedly made promises to the American people as the health care bill was being debated and even after the health care law was signed. He promised to improve, not hurt, the quality of medical care in this country.

We now know the President's health care law actually makes the problem of health care in this country worse. In fact, since this bill was signed into law, we have learned that it makes the cost of health care worse. We know it makes the American's ability to get health care worse and the ability of individuals to keep the care they like--it makes their ability to keep that care worse.

Today, I would like to first talk about the cost of care.

President Obama promised American families they would see their health insurance premiums go down because of the health care law, and he actually told them they would go down by over $2,000 per family. Well, now we know that is not the case. In fact, Americans have seen their premiums increase 19 percent since the time the President signed his health care bill into law.

I was looking at the front page of the Sheridan Press, Sheridan, WY, yesterday. Headline, front page:

Health care premium increase. County administrative director said the county's cost to provide health care coverage for its employees will increase by about $360,000 this year.

We are talking about 1 county--1 out of 23 counties in Wyoming, $360,000 for county employees.

You know, throughout this entire health care debate, the President promised the American people that if they liked their health care plan, his health care law would let them keep it--another broken promise. Employers all across the country have made it clear that the health care law's mandates are too expensive and threaten their ability to offer insurance to their employees.

A recent study by McKinsey & Company, which is a reputable national consulting firm, produced a report entitled ``How U.S. health care reform will affect employee benefits.'' They surveyed over 1,300 employers across diverse industries, geographies, and employer sizes. The results confirmed what Republicans and American workers and their families knew all along, and they knew it long before the President and Washington Democrats forced this health care law down their throats. Overall, the report says, 30 percent of employers will probably stop offering employer-sponsored coverage in the years after 2014 when the Obama health care law goes fully into effect. Among employers with a high awareness of the health care reform law and what is specifically in the law, then the proportion of those who will definitely or probably stop offering coverage jumps to 50 percent, and upward of 60 percent will pursue other options. So at least 30 percent of employers would actually gain economically from dropping coverage even if they completely compensated their employees for the change through other benefit offerings and higher salaries.

Apparently, the President's promise that ``if you like the health insurance you have today, you can keep it'' translates into ``you may very well lose your coverage.''

As former Congressional Budget Office Director Doug Holtz-Eakin's analysis confirms, if employers decided to drop coverage--which is in their economic best interest to do in many cases based on their economic evaluation--the cost of Federal insurance subsidies would skyrocket.

Remember, the White House and Democrats in Congress met behind closed doors. They acted swiftly and covertly to pass a law without regard for how its provisions would impact each and every American family.

Then the question is, Will Americans actually have the ability to get medical care they need from a doctor they want at a price they can afford? The President promised that his law would increase access to affordable care. Some groups tell a different story.

In April 2010, a month after the President signed his health care plan into law, the Association of American Medical Colleges estimated that based on graduation and training rates, this country would have a shortage of 150,000 doctors over the next 15 years. In May of the same year, the American Medical Association issued the results of its survey showing the impact of low payment rates and the threat of future payment cuts on Medicare patients' access to care. The AMA found that one in five physicians currently restricts the number of Medicare patients they see. The AMA study shows that nearly one-third of primary care physicians restrict the number of Medicare patients they take into their practice.

All any of the Members of the Senate need to do is, at home on the weekend, talk to someone in your community, someone who is on Medicare, someone who is trying to find a doctor, a doctor to care for them, and see how very difficult it is for someone on Medicare to find a doctor to care for them.

Well, later last year, the Association of American Medical Colleges related updated physician shortage estimates. The September 2010 study said that by 2015, doctor shortages will be actually 50 percent worse than originally projected. By 2020, there will be a shortage of 45,000 primary care physicians and a shortage of 46,000 surgeons and medical specialists.

So I find it ironic that we have a health care law that is passed that actually doesn't put money into training doctors to treat you but puts money in to hire IRS agents to investigate you. Absolutely astonishing.

These studies clearly demonstrate that the President's health care law will only make it harder for Americans to see their doctor. In fact, Washington only expanded the ability for folks to get government-approved, government-mandated, government-subsidized coverage. They did not expand the ability for the American people to get actual medical care. There is a huge difference between medical coverage and medical care. When you take over $500 billion away from our seniors on Medicare not to save Medicare but to start a brand new government program for someone else, well, that is a way to make the problem worse. When you force 16 million more people onto Medicaid, a program where half of the doctors in the country won't see those patients, that also makes the problem worse.

On the front page of yesterday's USA TODAY, Wednesday, July 6, the headline is ``Medicaid payments go under the knife.'' State cuts could add to shortage of doctors.

The second paragraph:

Some health care experts say the cuts, most of which went into effect July 1, or will later this month, could add to a shortage of physicians and other providers participating in Medicaid.

The article goes on:

Under the 2010 health care law, more than 16 million additional people will become eligible starting in 2014.

So already we have a situation where doctors are reluctant to take care of people on Medicaid. Yet the President's solution to the health care dilemma in this country is to put more people into a system that is already broken. We are giving individuals and families an insurance card but not really giving them access to the care that has been promised.

Adults are not the only ones waiting in lines to get into doctors offices as the lines get longer. In fact, children enrolled in Medicaid have a harder time accessing medical care than children who have private insurance. Yet that is the President's solution to the needs of this country.

On January 16 of this year, the New England Journal of Medicine published a study conducted in Cook County, IL. It is President Obama's hometown of Chicago. People were calling medical offices asking for appointments. They were asking for appointments for children with chronic conditions or acute conditions and telling the offices--these were kind of secret shoppers--the person had Medicaid or private insurance. What they found is 66 percent of the time when the researcher called for an appointment and they mentioned Medicaid, they were denied an appointment. But

only 11 percent of the researchers calling for appointments who said they had private insurance--only 11 percent would not get an appointment. So there you have 66 percent denied if they had Medicaid and only 11 percent denied with private insurance. Those Medicaid patients who did get an appointment, well, they faced wait times twice as long as kids with private insurance--an average of about 6 weeks. As one caller was told when asked what kind of insurance the person had--when that person said Medicaid, the receptionist at the medical office said: Medicaid is not insurance. Yet that is what the President and the Democrats base their entire health care plan on--16 million more on Medicaid.

Here it is over a year after the law has been signed, and the President's health care law has made health care in America worse. Premiums are higher, and the lines at doctors offices are longer. It is more difficult to get a doctor to care for you. This is not what the President's health care law was supposed to do, and it is not what the President promised the American people last year. He promised that the health care law would make health care better for all Americans. Each week, we learn that the promises are coming up empty and health care in America under this health care law has been made worse.

That is why week after week I come to the Senate floor as we learn more things about the health care law that passed the Senate, passed the House, was signed by the President, and, in my opinion as a doctor who practiced medicine for 24 years, has actually been bad for patients, bad for providers and nurses and doctors who take care of those patients, and bad for the taxpayers.

I yield the floor.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source