[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 20]
[House]
[Page 26752]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1745

            SUPPORTING BETTER HOME CARE FOR OLDER AMERICANS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Griffith) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. GRIFFITH. Madam Speaker, almost one in seven residents in my home 
State of Alabama is over the age of 65, a sector of the American 
population that is expected to grow dramatically over the next 2 
decades. As our citizens age, many will develop costly and debilitating 
health conditions that will require additional care and additional 
expenditures for the Medicare system.
  Advanced home health treatments are now targeting some of the most 
serious illnesses and have been successful in keeping more of the 
elderly out of the hospitals and reducing the cost to Medicare. There 
are numerous cases in Alabama where home health care has been 
instrumental in preventing emergency room visits and hospital 
readmissions and helping older residents to live more independently at 
home for as long as possible.
  Our goal is to improve the care of Americans and control rising 
costs, especially in our Medicare population. Home health care is 
meeting these goals and has the potential to do even more.
  Yet there are provisions in the House health reform legislation that 
would cut $57 billion from the Medicare home health program over the 
next decade. If these reductions remain in the bill, they will surely 
have an adverse effect on the access to home care for our senior 
citizens.
  The cuts in home health care services in the bill are significantly 
disproportionate to other provider sectors. The bill seeks 14 percent 
of all Medicare cuts from home health care, while home health makes up 
only 4 percent of the Medicare program currently. This disproportionate 
impact is further magnified by the fact that, unlike most other health 
care providers and insurers, expanding health insurance will have no 
meaningful increase in the home health care business.
  Home health patients average nearly 80 years of age and are already 
insured by Medicare and Medicaid. This means that the Medicare cuts to 
home health agencies are not offset by new revenues from newly insured 
patients. Instead, the proposed cuts of over 14 percent of spending on 
home health services will be as can be.
  For these reasons, I urge my colleagues to reject the proposed cuts 
to home health care and support better care at home for all older 
Americans.

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