Medicare Physician Payment Cuts Postponed

 

Lawmakers of both parties recently struck a deal to postpone a massive cut in Medicare pay for doctors. The agreement between the Senate Finance Committee chairman, Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana, and the panel’s top Republican, Charles Grassley of Iowa, calls for paying doctors at current levels through Dec. 31, and fully offsetting the cost.

The deal, expected to be approved by the House and Senate, would stave off a 23 percent cut in doctors’ pay scheduled to take effect Dec. 1. Baucus and Grassley also pledged to work together toward a mutually acceptable 12-month postponement that could pass before the end of this year.

Doctors were threatening to stop taking new Medicare patients if the cut went through, and analysts warned that the situation would undermine the health care program for 46 million elderly and disabled. Health care for military service members, families, and retirees also would be jeopardized because Tricare payments are tied to Medicare’s.

The steep cuts are the consequence of a 1990s budget-balancing law that has failed to control Medicare costs. At the time, lawmakers devised a formula for automatic cuts as a braking system to keep Medicare spending in line. However, when costs went up, Congress usually hit the override button and postponed the cuts. That only meant reductions got bigger the next time.

-From “Jobless benefits extension blocked GOP in House opposes the bill”, by Andrew Taylor, the Associated Press, Boston.com, November 19, 2010, http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2010/11/19/jobless_benefits_extension_blocked/, retrieved 11/19/10.

 

 

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