June 14, 2001

 
Chairman Bilirakis, I am pleased that the Health Subcommittee is conducting this hearing on Medicare reform. The Subcommittee will examine many important and complex questions today, such as how to reduce the coinsurance that seniors with lengthy hospital stays must pay and how to improve the administration of the Medicare program. I would caution my colleagues, however, not to jump to the conclusion that merging Parts A and B of the Medicare program is the only way to achieve these goals.

We can improve Medicare’s coverage of catastrophic expenses without necessarily combining Parts A and B. We can give the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) the flexibility to contract with one entity that can process both Part A and Part B claims. We can reduce the complexity of the program for seniors by increasing the funding in beneficiary education programs. In fact, even if we were to merge Parts A and B of Medicare, it would do nothing to accomplish these objectives without a corresponding commitment from Congress to increase the resources that HCFA has to administer the Medicare program.

When discussing whether to merge Medicare Parts A and B, the most important question is how will it affect the millions of Americans who depend on this program for their health care, most of whom are living on fixed incomes and are already spending a significant portion of their income on health care costs.

For that reason, we should acknowledge that the most important thing we can do today to improve the Medicare program is to add a meaningful prescription drug benefit that is available and affordable for every beneficiary. Before we embark on a long and contentious debate about Medicare reform, Congress should show seniors that we hear their most immediate concerns, and respond by creating a universal prescription drug benefit in Medicare.

I look forward to hearing today’s witnesses, but I also eagerly await the opportunity to move forward on the reform that we all agree is most urgently needed: Medicare prescription drugs.