[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 85 (Monday, June 24, 2002)]
[House]
[Page H3841]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
PRESCRIPTION DRUG BENEFIT
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Brown) is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, early Friday morning, under cover of
night, the Republican plan to create a Medicare prescription drug
benefit was forced through the Committee on Energy and Commerce on
strict party lines.
The prescription drug proposal made by the Republican leadership in
Congress is so farfetched and so inadequate that it is an insult to the
seniors it alleges to help. This legislation calls for private
insurance companies to deliver drug coverage, and the coverage is
minimal.
We sought to improve the bill, but our efforts were stymied by a
coalition of the Republican leadership and their corporate sponsors,
the brand name drug industry.
Democrats insist that any prescription drug plan for seniors should
be administered through Medicare, the program seniors know and trust.
We have insisted the benefits be at least as generous as the coverage
enjoyed by Members of Congress, and we sought to lower drug prices,
ending drug industry patent abuses and enhancing competition in the
prescription drug marketplace.
The need for a prescription drug benefit under Medicare is
undisputed. Twelve million American seniors lack any form of drug
coverage. This situation is made worse by the fact that American
seniors and others without drug coverage pay the highest prices in the
world for their prescriptions.
This is not the first time Republicans have attempted to capitalize
on the need of America's seniors for a drug benefit but is the most
blatant. Republican after Republican will come to the House floor in
the next 3 days, saying seniors deserve a drug benefit as good as
Members of Congress have. Unfortunately, though, according to the
nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, the Republican plan is 40
percent less than the coverage offered to Members of Congress.
During last week's markup, I offered an amendment that would replace
the standard coverage in the Republican bill with the same coverage
offered to Members of Congress.
{time} 1930
But the night before the amendment was offered, Republicans adjourned
the committee markup early so that they could attend a $30 million
fundraising dinner underwritten by Glaxo-Wellcome, a British
pharmaceutical company which gave $250,000 that night to the Republican
Party. When Republicans returned from that fundraiser in which the drug
companies gave well over a million dollars in total, when they returned
from that fundraiser the next day, it came as no surprise that
Republican colleagues voted my amendment down, meaning that the House
will be forced to vote this week on legislation that would provide
seniors with a significantly less drug benefit than Members of the
Congress. In other words, Republicans are going to give Members of
Congress a much better drug benefit than seniors will enjoy.
The Republican bill is not designed to ensure that seniors and
disabled Americans gain access to drug coverage. It is designed to
ensure that seniors and disabled Americans lose access to what they
want to do, which is privatize Medicare. Unless the goal is to phase
out Medicare and phase in an insurance voucher system, it makes no
sense to maintain a public program for medical and surgical benefits
but for seniors to purchase private coverage for prescription drug
benefits. If this bill is not about privatizing Medicare, if it is
actually meant to provide seniors real drug coverage, why is there a
hole in the plan's coverage? Why do the benefits decline as an
enrollee's drug costs go up? Insurance is supposed to protect
individuals with high health care costs, not to desert them. So why
this kind of Republican plan that serves the insurance interests and
drug company interests but not seniors?
On May 8 the United Seniors Association, a group funded by the
prescription drug industry, announced it would begin a $3 million
television ad campaign touting the GOP drug prescription drug plan.
Guess who is paying for the media blitz? The Pharmaceutical Research
and Manufacturers of America are paying for the media blitz, a trade
group representing major drug companies. In other words, the drug
industry is using dollars they gouge from American consumers to
advertise the Republican drug bill.
What should that say? Would they advertise a bill they thought would
be hard on the drug companies and drive a hard bargain with America's
drug companies? Drug companies do not like the Democrats' bill because
we harness the collective purchasing power of 40 million Medicare
beneficiaries to demand discounts, volume discounts, to demand fair
prices. Our bill gives seniors good coverage, real coverage, reliable
coverage just like Medicare, plus we are tough on the drug companies.
Glaxo-Wellcome, the company that sponsored the major Republican
fundraiser last week, charges Americans the highest prices in the world
for prescription drugs. Listen to that again. Glaxo-Wellcome, British-
owned prescription drug company, charges seniors the highest prices of
any country in the world. The Republican plan is written by and for the
drug companies. The Democrats' plan supports seniors.
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