[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 13]
[House]
[Page 18791]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                  HMO'S WANT $15 BILLION FROM CONGRESS

  (Mr. BROWN of Ohio asked and was given permission to address the 
House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, last year taxpayers spent $3 billion 
more on people enrolled in Medicare HMOs than if they had remained in 
traditional Medicare. It cost the public more to pay managed care plans 
than to pay for the same plans financed through traditional Medicare.
  I do not recall Medicare managed care plans offering to give back the 
excess dollars they were paid then. I do recall them unceremoniously 
dropping 200,000 seniors that year, claiming the Federal Government was 
underpaying them.
  Now Medicare HMOs and Republican leaders are asking Congress to 
devote $15 billion, three-fourths of the dollars set aside for Medicare 
funding increases this year, to Medicare HMOs. They serve 14 percent of 
the Medicare population; they want 75 percent of the money. They want 
$15 billion.
  That is $15 billion that Republicans want to give to the managed care 
industry after they abandoned 900,000 seniors; not because these plans 
were going bankrupt, but because other lines of business were more 
profitable for insurance companies HMOs. It is incomprehensible to me, 
Mr. Speaker, that my Republican colleagues and the Presidential 
candidates are trying to sell the public on privatizing Medicare. It is 
a bad idea.

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