The Ongoing Health Care Debate

Floor Speech

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Mr. DesJARLAIS. I thank the gentleman, and I think it's great that we're taking time tonight to discuss such an important issue that is so near and dear to all of our seniors because this last year, quite frankly, has been a very confusing time as we try to reform and fix the problems that face Medicare today.

We have, without a doubt, a number of seniors who are having trouble finding access to care right now for all the reasons my colleagues have stated, that we have a flawed payment formula in the SGR, sustained growth rate formula, and we've made attempts to correct that this year. But, again, as they so often have done now for the past 13, 14 years, they've just pushed the problem down the road rather than deal with it. I don't think it hurts to review for a minute what problems are facing Medicare.

We can't deny for a second, Mr. Speaker, that Medicare is going broke. You can talk to any number of agencies. Whether it is the CBO, AARP, we all know that Medicare is on an unsustainable course. Medicare is quite simply going to be broke in about 10 years. That's not a Republican problem. That's not a Democrat problem. That's a people problem. What we're here about tonight is to make sure that our seniors don't have to worry where their health care is going to come from.

We must get together and take steps to make sure that their access to care is preserved and protected. We did this earlier last year with the Paul Ryan budget. We put forth a sensible reform that would put Medicare on a path to sustainability. If you're 55 or older, you don't have to worry about any changes to your health care. That was grossly distorted in the press and the media. We were accused of--literally, there were TV ads made of pushing an elderly person off a cliff. This is just plain and simple wrong to create that kind of uncertainty for our seniors.

The bottom line is we have 10,000 new Medicare recipients entering the Medicare pool every day. We have a situation where when Medicare was first formed in 1965, the average life expectancy of a male was 68. Thanks to advances in medicine, men and women both are living at least 10 years longer. However, this was not managed in the budgeting for Medicare and hence we've gone deeper and deeper into debt. Now our average couple that pays about $109,000 into the Medicare system over a lifetime extracts about $340,000. That's about a dollar in for $3 out. Again, there's no denying that we have a problem and this is going broke.

Well, the Republicans did offer a solution, as my colleagues and I have said. However, right now, the IPAB is the only solution we've seen in President Obama's plan to cut costs, but it is going to gut $500 billion from our seniors; and that's the fact they need to know about. They need to call their Representatives.

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Mr. DesJARLAIS. My friend is absolutely correct. What we need to do here, if nothing else, is we need to agree on the facts; and the facts, as you just stated, are that Medicare is going broke. It is on an unsustainable course. So Medicare must be changed as we know it, as you said.

You mentioned your mother. My mother happens to be having her 73rd birthday today. It's a happy birthday for my mother today, but I hope that she has many more happy birthdays to come. We all have those stories. We all have parents, grandparents, people on Medicare who are counting on us. They are looking at the arguments going on in this Chamber and they are confused. They don't know what to believe.

So I think if we can agree, as you said, to the facts and then sit down and have a meaningful discussion of how we can preserve and protect this program for future generations, then that's half the battle.

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Mr. DesJARLAIS. I agree with what you are saying; and I guarantee you, any of the seniors watching tonight, listening to this debate, they don't care whether the Republicans win this debate or whether the Democrats win this debate. That's irrelevant. What they want to know is that they are going to have access to care. And I think it's so essential that we repeal this IPAB.

The gentleman was with me earlier today at a press conference when they asked about all the rhetoric last year about these being called death panels. That may sound a little bit theatrical, but I can tell you, as a physician, that if I'm treating a patient who is 78 or 88 and they've got some form of cancer and this IPAB board decides in the government one-size-fits-all mentality to throw a blanket over seniors of a certain age who have a certain disease--and cancer is probably one to pick--that they don't necessarily need to spend that expensive money on chemotherapy or experimental drugs or perhaps they don't even want me to order the MRI to detect the cancer, now if you are 78 or 88--that may sound so old to some people, but I know a lot of people that age that are very active. They have got 15 or 20 grandchildren, and those grandchildren enjoy their company. So if they make a decision that these people shouldn't get that treatment, and that's very well what could happen with this board, then you decide what kind of panel or what kind of name you want to put on it.

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Mr. DesJARLAIS. I'll just add one more point. I can tell you that there's not a senior I've talked to that wants a bureaucrat in the exam room with us making their decisions. We build relationships with those patients. There's a trust between the patient and their doctor, and I'll guarantee you the patients don't want bureaucrats overseeing that exam room making those decisions for them. So when we move forward with these reforms, we certainly need to keep that in mind.

I would like to thank the gentleman for leading this hour on such an important topic.

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