[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 65 (Tuesday, May 11, 2004)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E811]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   INTRODUCTION OF A BILL TO PROHIBIT THE OPERATION OF THE MEDICARE 
    COMPARATIVE COST ADJUSTMENT PROGRAM IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

                                 ______
                                 

                       HON. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON

                      of the district of columbia

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, May 11, 2004

  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, today, I am pleased to introduce a bill to 
prevent the District of Columbia from becoming a test case for the 
privatization of Medicare. A Medicare comparative cost demonstration 
project under part C of Title XVIII of the Social Security Act was a 
part of the new Medicare prescription drug law. My bill is one of 
several introduced by members of Congress designed to prevent the 
federal government from making a particular district one of the six 
testing grounds for the entire country.
  The Medicare prescription drug legislation, signed into law on 
December 8, 2003, contained a little-noticed but crucial provision 
designed to lead to the privatization of Medicare. Section 214(a) of 
the Medicare bill established up to six ``premium support'' 
demonstration projects starting in 2010. These demonstration projects 
will provide health care vouchers for private insurance to eligible 
Medicare beneficiaries. As a result, Medicare will compete directly 
against private plans in offering services to older Americans.
  I strongly oppose the voucher approach because seniors who choose to 
remain or must remain in the traditional fee-for-service plan will pay 
significantly higher premiums than they pay now. The private plans will 
be able to cherry pick the healthiest and youngest seniors to enroll in 
their plans while turning away older, sicker people. Traditional 
Medicare, therefore, will have very high costs and premiums because it 
will not be able to spread the burden over the larger and most diverse 
pool of seniors. This ``competition'' proposal is stacked to portray 
Medicare as inefficient and expensive in order to give the program's 
critics the manufactured evidence to get the privatization result they 
want from a premium pool of cherry picked seniors.
  The Medicare law did not specify where the demonstration projects 
will take place, but said they will be in 6 metropolitan statistical 
areas to be determined by the Secretary of Health and Human Services. 
This experiment is the result of a compromise that was necessary to 
keep the privatized vouchers from going nationwide immediately. The 
determination to privatize Medicare and Social Security remains a goal 
of the Republican Congress and of President Bush, however. Like others 
who have filed similar bills, my bill says count the District of 
Columbia out.

                          ____________________