May ‘11
10
Messaging the New Health Reform Law
During the first 46 days of the new session of Congress, the House held 45 hearings involving Secretary Sebelius or other HHS officials criticizing the Affordable Care Act. Not much going on in the Democratic Senate. Especially the once-powerful Senate Finance Committee whose chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) was busy writing to Medtronic demanding the company prove that by cancelling five contracts with “group purchasing” company Novation, LLC, it was not raising the costs of the Medicare program. Group purchasing companies exist to negotiate purchases for hospitals on the presumption high volume and select product purchases are good for patients and hospitals. They also exist to make their c-suites wealthy at the expense of Medicare and patients and there is no proof their judgment about quality or appropriateness is any better than anyone else in the supply chain.
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