“CMS’ goal here is to cut down on the number of procedures. The same device has been approved in Europe for almost 5 years and has gained widespread use by patients who want to forgo very invasive open-heart surgeries—for good reason. The minimally invasive approach poses a lot less hardship on patients. This ruling will force people to get open-heart surgeries that might have been avoidable. These decisions used to be left to patients and doctors. Now it’s clear that for costly procedures, Washington will be making more of these choices for us.”
“But it is telling that this progressive champion of higher taxes, who delivers viral mini monologues about the greatness of giving back and paying one’s corporate fair share in exchange for valuable government services, can so easily transform her Senate campaign into a vehicle for obvious industry talking points. This is one of the reasons why the cost savings schemes in the 2010 health care overhaul probably won’t work. Those provisions generally save money by either taxing someone’s benefits (specifically the sort of expensive health plans held by many union members) or reducing someone’s payments (higher payments to Medicare advantage plans).”
“ObamaCare’s core philosophies are standardization and centralization, which in practice will mean higher costs for everyone caused by suffocating price competition. The share of insurance industry revenue that comes from government now stands at 42%, up from 36% just three years ago, and that’s before the new entitlement kicks in. And a wave of ObamaCare-promoted provider consolidation is creating hospital monopolies that can demand higher-than-competitive prices.”
“President Obama’s health reform law doesn’t offer much encouragement, for two primary reasons: its Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) and Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI).
Comprised of 15 health care experts who have yet to be appointed by the president, IPAB is charged with finding ways to reduce cost growth in Medicare starting in 2013.
IPAB will set target growth rates for Medicare. If spending on the entitlement exceeds those rates, then the panel will make cost-cutting recommendations.”
“To help pay ObamaCare’s steep costs, Washington placed a tax on medical device sales. The ugly results: Higher costs that hurt patients, destroy jobs and curb the innovation that extends life and brings relief.
The basic medical devices that we can buy at the retail level won’t be subject to the tax, which begins next year. But devices sold by wholesalers to health care providers will be.”
“Unfortunately, Obamacare threatens to bring American innovation to a screeching halt. To fund their trillion-dollar health care plan, Democrats socked some of their favorite villains — insurers, drug companies and medical device firms — with onerous new taxes.
The impact of these new taxes on health care innovation will be nothing short of disastrous. They will deprive firms of money that they otherwise might spend on research and development.”
“A year from now, the federal government will start collecting a new tax on medical devices from tongue depressors to imaging machines, thanks to the sweeping health-care overhaul that Democrats enacted in the spring of 2010… Device makers complain that the tax will lead not only to higher prices and layoffs but also to reduced research and development. They also say that when combined with high U.S. corporate-tax rates, the device levy makes relocation to other countries more appealing.”
“Yesterday, I interviewed U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan, Chairman of the House Committee on the Budget, about the near complete absence of market signals in health care in the U.S., the future of medical innovation under the Affordable Care Act, and how providers – finally – might be coming around to the view that a market-based, patient-centered health care system is the only thing that will save them from gradual strangulation under IPAB’s price control regime.”
“Medical device maker Stryker Corp said it will cut 5 percent, or about 1000 jobs to largely offset costs related to the scheduled implementation of the new Medical Device Excise Tax in 2013.”
“Under President Obama’s health care plan, the United States Preventive Services Task Force now wields great power to decide which health services (like mammograms) doctors should provide, yet it has few checks on its sweeping authority.
Its mandates are likely to raise health insurance costs and premiums, while reducing the number of covered preventive services.
To improve accountability for an agency that is both out of date with the medical community and out of touch with the public, Congress should closely monitor the impact new mandates have on patient care.”