[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 25 (Wednesday, March 8, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1267-S1268]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    PRESCRIPTION DRUG AFFORDABILITY

  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I have come to the floor repeatedly over 
the last few months to talk about the importance of prescription drug 
coverage under Medicare for the Nation's senior citizens. Today I want 
to focus on how the absence of this coverage essentially undermines our 
entire health care system.
  What we are seeing is that every day, in the United States, senior 
citizens who are ailing from a variety of health problems end up 
getting sicker because they are not able to afford their prescription 
medicine. Very often these seniors end up being hospitalized and 
needing vastly more expensive medical services that are made available 
under what is called Part A of the Medicare program.
  Today, I want to describe a case I recently learned about in 
Hillsboro, OR, because it illustrates just how irrational, how 
extraordinarily illogical, it is to have a health care system for the 
Nation's senior citizens that does not cover prescription drugs.
  An orthopedist from Hillsboro, OR, recently wrote me that he actually 
had to hospitalize a patient for over 6 weeks because the patient 
needed antibiotics that they were not covered on an outpatient basis.
  Here you had a frail, vulnerable older person. The physician, and all 
the medical specialists involved, believed that person could be treated 
on an outpatient basis with antibiotics, but because there was not 
Medicare coverage available on an outpatient basis--because there was 
not the kind of coverage Senator Daschle has been talking about and 
Senator Snowe and I have made available in the Snowe-Wyden bipartisan 
legislation--because that coverage was not available to the senior 
citizen in Hillsboro, OR, that older person had to be hospitalized for 
over 6 weeks.
  Here is what the doctor said to me:

       This method of treatment [the preferred outpatient method 
     of treatment] is cost effective and is preferred by patients 
     and doctors. In this case, the patient is condemned to spend 
     6 weeks in the hospital solely to receive intravenous 
     antibiotics. To me, this seems like a tremendous waste of 
     money and resources. The patient would be better at home.

  What this case illustrates is exactly why we need, on a bipartisan 
basis--the Snowe-Wyden legislation is one approach; our colleagues may 
have other ideas on how to do it--but this is a case study on why it is 
so important to cover prescription drugs for older people under 
Medicare.
  We are not talking about some abstract academic kind of analysis that 
comes from one of the think tanks here in Washington, DC. This is a 
physician in Hillsboro, OR, who had to put a patient, an older person, 
in a hospital for 6 weeks because they could not afford to get their 
medicine on an outpatient basis.
  A lot of our colleagues are here on the floor who are on the Commerce 
Committee. We look at technology issues at that Committee. The irony 
is, we can save money, again, through the use of new technology in 
health care.
  The kind of treatment that would have been best for this older person 
in Oregon would have been through an electronic delivery system the 
older person could have used on their belt for a relatively short 
period of time had Medicare covered that prescription the older person 
needed. But because that person could not get coverage for the 
antibiotics and use that electronic delivery system on an outpatient 
basis, which they could wear on their belt, they had to go into a 
hospital for 6 weeks.
  Colleagues, we are going to hear a lot over this break from senior 
citizens and families about the importance of this issue. I intend 
tomorrow, again, to come to the floor and discuss this matter. Senator 
Daschle has made it very clear to me, and talks about it virtually 
every day, that he wants to have the Senate find the common ground. He 
wants Senators to come together and deal with this on a bipartisan 
basis. The Snowe-Wyden legislation is one approach. Our colleagues have 
other bills.

  The point is, let us make sure, in this session of Congress, that in 
Arkansas, in Washington, and in the State of Nevada, we do not have 
older people hospitalized unnecessarily for 6 weeks because we have not 
come together as a Senate to make sure they can get those medicines on 
an outpatient basis.
  Science has given us cost-effective, practical remedies for these 
people in need, remedies that will reduce suffering and will reduce 
costs to taxpayers.
  Let us come together, on a bipartisan basis, to make sure we do not 
adjourn without adding this important benefit to the Medicare program.
  As I have made clear, I intend to keep coming back to the floor of 
the Senate until we, on a bipartisan basis, as Senator Daschle has 
suggested, come together and get this important job done.

[[Page S1268]]

  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.

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