As I wrote in July of this year, seniors need a reliable prescription drug plan to help them cover the rising costs of medications. In August, seniors underscored this message in a series of town hall meetings I held throughout our communities. From Oak Harbor to Everett to Bellingham, seniors expressed their deep concerns about skyrocketing prescription drugs costs and the need for action on a prescription drug bill.
They also had another clear message: Reject any bill that does not help.
After analyzing the prescription drug bill that passed this week, I concluded that it was bad medicine for seniors and a raw deal for Washington state.
First, the bill prevents seniors from purchasing affordable and safe medications from Canada, critical to seniors in the 2nd Congressional District, which neighbors Canada. Even as I write this, the Bush administration is working to stop seniors from accessing safe and affordable medications from Canada, where the average price of drugs is 140 percent less than it is in our communities. The pharmaceutical lobby is taking credit for killing this provision of the bill even though the Republicans and Democrats in the House earlier overwhelmingly voted to allow seniors to travel to Canada for safe and affordable drugs.
Second, this bill specifically prohibits negotiation for better drug prices for seniors. This prohibition leaves seniors to pay full prices instead of helping them with high drug costs. We already allow similar negotiation for veterans who get medications through the Department of Veterans Affairs. We even allowed the government to negotiate better prices for Cipro during the anthrax scare in 2001 when people’s lives were at stake. Isn’t the quality of life of all seniors at stake now? In the end this bill protects the pharmaceutical industry rather than seniors in my district.
Third, more than 49,000 retirees in Washington are expected to lose their current employer-sponsored health coverage due to a lack of adequate incentives in the bill for employers to keep retirees on their plans, according to an Emory University study.
One of my top priorities is to ensure that Medicare reimbursements to local hospitals and doctors are more fair so local seniors are treated on par with others around the country. Bill provisions unrelated to the prescription drug benefit do not address the fairness issue but do help local hospitals and doctors with the chronic problem of low reimbursement rates. In the last five months, I have voted nine times to increase Medicare funding for hospitals and doctors. My commitment to their assistance is clear.
When it comes to something as important as affordable prescription drugs for seniors, politics needs to take a back seat. It is interesting that groups like Citizens for a Sound Economy, the Heritage Foundation and the Club for Growth, all identified with conservative voices in the country, agree with the AFL-CIO, Families USA and the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare that Congress should have defeated this bill, while major drug companies wanted Congress to pass it.
If Democrats and Republicans want to do the right thing, they would bring relief to health care access for seniors by immediately increasing hospital and doctor reimbursements and go back to the drawing board to develop a real bipartisan deal on a prescription drug benefit instead of the raw deal this bill brings.
Rep. Rick Larsen (D-Washington) represents the 2nd Congressional District, which includes most of Snohomish County and all of Island, Skagit, Whatcom and San Juan counties.
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