Never willing to allow a successful law go unchallenged, there are renewed efforts to undermine the Medicare Prescription Drug Improvement and Modernization Act, the bipartisan 2003 law that created the Part D prescription drug benefit for seniors on Medicare.
We at the Institute for Policy Innovation raised a number of concerns when the law was being debated, not because of its structure, but because it created a new entitlement program for every senior rather than targeting only low-income seniors with no drug coverage.
What’s surprising about Medicare Part D, though, is that it has actually cost the government significantly less than original estimates, and the vast majority of seniors seem to be very satisfied with it. So naturally some in Congress think a policy success story like that shouldn’t be allowed to stand; that would shatter Congress’s record for legislative incompetence.
And so there are new efforts to end what’s known as the “non-interference” provision, which restricts the Department of Health and Human Services from “interfering” in the prescription drug price negotiations between the drug companies that make the drugs, the health plans that pay for them, and the pharmacies that sell them.
Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) and President Obama think the government could negotiate much lower prices, even though the Congressional Budget Office has repeatedly disagreed. According to the CBO:
By itself, giving the Secretary [of HHS] broad authority to negotiate drug prices would not provide the leverage necessary to generate lower prices than those obtained by PDPs [prescription drug plans] and thus would have a negligible effect on Medicare drug spending.
What the non-interference reformers really want is for the federal government to set price controls on prescription drugs. They call it “negotiation” now, but their real goal is dictation.
Remember that Obama, Reed and every Senate Democrat also believed that by giving the government more control over your health insurance you would pay less for coverage. If you like your prescription drug plan, you can keep your prescription drug plan.
The Prescription Drug Act—which included the establishment of Health Savings Accounts and the Medicare Advantage program—has turned out to be one of Washington’s health care success stories. Obamacare is Washington's biggest failure. The real irony is the president repeatedly praises the failed program, but demands changes to the one success.