[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 91 (Thursday, June 24, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7582-S7583]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        PATIENTS' BILL OF RIGHTS

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I would just like to first thank my 
colleagues from South Dakota, Massachusetts, and California for 
bringing up this issue.
  Let me just say that, again, as I travel across my State, the issue 
of the Patients' Bill of Rights is one that is foremost on the minds of 
my constituents. I have heard their pleas and complaints. I have heard 
about horrible situations that people are forced into. I have heard 
about the fears of tens of thousands of people in each community who do 
not have a problem now with their HMO, but having heard about a 
relative, a friend, a professional colleague who has, they worry about 
having one themselves.
  So the bottom line is a simple one. We wish to have a free and open 
debate. That is our position. It is more important than many of the 
issues we were debating.
  I heard the majority leader say we had to do the foreign operations 
bill. That is a bill that is important to me and to many of my 
constituents but hardly one as important as the Patients' Bill of 
Rights.

[[Page S7583]]

  So what we are saying on this side is the following: That there has 
been such a breakdown in the patient-doctor relationship, and with the 
intrusion of that patient-doctor relationship by an army of accountants 
and actuaries and bureaucrats who are making decisions that should be 
made by doctors and nurses and hospitals, that something has to be 
done.
  We disagree on cost issues. The Senator from Oklahoma thought it 
would raise costs 13, 14, 15 percent. The Senator from Massachusetts 
has a CBO estimate--CBO is impartial--that says it would be the cost of 
a Big Mac a month to a family. But the very least is that we should be 
debating that issue, debating it fully and openly.
  The Senator from Oklahoma has said that it was not his intention, 
when he offered his proposal, that someone filibuster and take the 
whole 30 hours or the whole week just filibustering.
  That may well be the case, but there may be one of the 100 Senators 
who feels so strongly against this issue that he would take to the 
floor to filibuster. Unless we can get in the confines of the agreement 
that we will be able to vote on the very important issues that are part 
of the Patients' Bill of Rights, then how can we agree? Because if we 
were to agree now--and there are so many thousands of our constituents 
on whose hopes and even prayers this legislation rests--and we were not 
to get those votes, and instead someone would filibuster, they would 
all think we had let them down.
  So the bottom line is a very simple one. The bottom line is, yes, we 
can come to an agreement, but the agreement, from our point of view, 
needs to allow open debate and votes on a whole series of issues. My 
guess is we won't win every one, but my guess is we will win a good 
number.

  To have an agreement that might allow one person to filibuster the 
whole time, even though it may not be the majority whip's intention, to 
have an agreement that would not allow the major issues to be not only 
debated but voted upon would be a serious miscarriage of the hopes of 
millions of Americans who wish to see the patient-doctor relationship 
restored. It would have been much better if we had done that debate 
this week.
  As I mentioned to the majority whip, the feeling on this side of the 
aisle of frustration, that the open process on which the Senate has 
prided itself for 200 years would no longer be allowed, led to our view 
that we would make sure and do everything in our power within the rules 
of the Senate to see that open debate and votes on the Patients' Bill 
of Rights occurred.
  I think we are doing a service to our constituents. I think this is 
what they sent us to the Senate to do. I will be doing everything I 
can, helping our minority leader, helping the senior Senator from 
Massachusetts and all of my other colleagues who care so much about 
this issue, to see that we get that open, full debate and the votes on 
the very important issues of the Patients' Bill of Rights to which our 
constituents are entitled.
  I thank the Chair, and I yield back the remainder of my time.
  Mr. WELLSTONE addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, are we in a quorum call?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. We are in morning business.

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