[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 38, Number 28 (Monday, July 15, 2002)]
[Pages 1171-1176]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on Prescription Drugs in Minneapolis, Minnesota

July 11, 2002

    Thank you all very much for that warm welcome. I appreciate you 
coming out today and giving me a chance to talk about how do we work 
together to make America a more secure place and a better place for all 
of us. And part of making sure America is a better place for each and 
every one of us and a more secure place is to make sure we've got a 
health care system that is responsive and vibrant and alive and well and 
a place--a system that will really relate to each and every one of us as 
an individual, give each and every one of us a chance, as we grow older, 
to have a health care system that we can be proud of and confident in.
    That's why I started my day here in Minnesota at the University of 
Minnesota Medical School. You were probably wondering why Yudof was 
relevant. [Laughter] That's because he hosted me at a fine medical 
school. And there I had the honor and opportunity to talk to some fellow 
Minnesotans about how to advance medicine, some of the research that was 
taking place. I talked to some patients and heard from some of our 
elderly about how--what kind of system was necessary to have the quality 
of life that we want for each and every one of us.
    It's--the key is to make sure that we advance medicine in a way that 
makes sure that our citizens get access to new drugs, new lifesaving 
drugs, unbelievably innovative drugs that have changed medicine as we 
know it. And it starts with making sure our seniors have got a guarantee 
of a prescription drug coverage in Medicare. That's where it ought to 
start. It ought to start with our seniors, who have paid their dues.
    And as we do so, as we look at Medicare to make sure it includes 
prescription drugs, we must make sure that whatever system evolves does 
not undermine the great innovations which take place in America. And 
that's

[[Page 1172]]

important to remember, that as we debate this issue in Congress, as 
Congress debates the issue--and of course I'm watching attentively--
[laughter]--that we do not undermine the great strength of the American 
system, which is the capacity to be on the cutting edge of new 
technologies which save lives.
    The House has passed a good first step, by the way, in reforming and 
making sure Medicare is modern and capable. And I hope the Senate acts 
quickly and gets a responsible bill into conference so that we can get a 
bill to my desk, and we can get moving to doing what is right for the 
American people.
    I appreciate so very much Tommy Thompson traveling with me today. He 
is--he has been a fine, fine Secretary of Health and Human Services. He 
was a great Governor of Wisconsin, and he has brought a lot of 
innovation to--[applause].
    There's a lot of folks I could introduce. I want to introduce one 
other person, a person I had the opportunity to meet at the airport when 
I came in. One of the things I like to do is to herald kind of the quiet 
heroes of our society, those who volunteer to make their communities a 
better place. I met Pearl Lam Bergad when I came earlier today. I don't 
know if you've ever heard of Pearl Lam here in your community, but she 
has done a magnificent job of heralding the cultural life of Minnesota. 
She is a remarkable volunteer. Where are you, Pearl Lam? She's somewhere 
here. She must not have gotten a very good seat. [Laughter] Oh, there 
you are, Pearl Lam. Please stand up, will you? Thank you for coming.
    She's worked tirelessly to promote and improve cultural awareness in 
the community. She did so without any Government agency telling her what 
to do. She did so because she wanted to serve. She did so because she 
had a talent she wanted to share. You see, the great strength of the 
country is the fact that we've got a nation full of people who really, 
honestly, decently care about the communities in which they live and 
want to do something about it. And so, Pearl Lam, I want to thank you, 
on behalf of the thousands and millions of others in our country, for 
volunteering.
    I called up my friend Mark Yudof and invited myself here because 
Minnesota is one of the leading centers of health care innovation in our 
country. And that's saying a lot. People come from all around the world 
to come to the University of Minnesota's cancer center. I don't know if 
you know that or not, but it's one of the most famous cancer centers. We 
thought we were pretty good in Texas--[laughter]--but you're really good 
here. This university performed the first successful bone marrow 
transplant and is one of the world's leaders in curing childhood 
leukemia and other cancers. There's a lot of incredible work going on 
right here in your neighborhood.
    Patients from all over the globe have had their lives saved by heart 
devices and other medical products invented by the hundreds of medical 
companies that have their homes in what you call Medical Alley in the 
Minneapolis area, and I know we've got some of the entrepreneurs, the 
medical entrepreneurs here with us today. And I want to thank you for 
your work, and I want to thank you for employing people.
    People from every corner of the world come to a clinic in southern 
Minnesota called Mayo Clinic. I know something about that, because my 
mother's on the board. [Laughter] Whew, those must be amazing board 
meetings. [Laughter] Sorry, Mom. [Laughter] But the Mayo Clinic's 
countless breakthroughs include effective drug treatment for 
tuberculosis and other diseases, and the clinic now has branches all 
across the country to make sure our seniors get the best possible health 
care.
    I just met with a Mayo Clinic cardiologist named Doug Wood. I want 
to share a story he told me. I think it helps make my point about the 
need for us to stay on the cutting edge of drug therapy.
    When he was a resident less than 25 years ago, the only real 
decision he had in treating a heart attack patient was how long to keep 
him or her in bed. That was the most important decision he had to make 
after the heart attack, how long will bed rest last. He could do more 
than just offer comfort, and knowing Doug, he offered a lot of comfort.

[[Page 1173]]

    But today, thanks to progress in drug treatments, Dr. Wood uses a 
wide range of treatments to limit the damage from heart attack, to stop 
any further progress of the heart disease, and to prevent it from 
happening in the first place. In 25 short years, the ability for this 
healer to make a significant difference in the lives of those who have 
had heart diseases is amazing. It is a fantastic development in our 
society.
    And the future promises even more breakthroughs. That's the exciting 
thing about America. Thanks to the rapidly evolving field of genetic 
medicine, doctors may soon be able to prescribe individually suited 
drugs based on their patients' genetic makeup. If you think about that--
you've got a particular problem and the drug will be designed to meet 
your need--it's medicine at its most basic level.
    But there's a problem, and I think we all recognize it now in our 
society, and we need to do something about it. And no matter how 
exciting the new drug therapies are, they're oftentimes very costly. 
Because Medicare--and what makes it even worse is that Medicare does not 
cover most prescription drugs. That's reality. Too many seniors, because 
that's the case--because they're too costly and Medicare doesn't cover 
them--too many of our seniors are forced to chose between paying for 
their pills or paying basic bills. And that's not right in America.
    And the reason why is because the Medicare system was designed for a 
different time. It's old. It is--it served a noble purpose, and it made 
a huge difference in a lot of people's lives. But it was designed at a 
time, for example, when surgery was common and the miraculous 
prescription drugs we have today were not only available--not available, 
but some people hadn't even thought about them yet.
    We need a Medicare system that is updated and modern, to serve the 
seniors of today with the medicine of today and to be able to serve the 
seniors of tomorrow, guys like me, with the medicines of tomorrow. We 
need a system which works.
    I support a prescription drug benefit in Medicare that allows 
seniors to choose the drug coverage that is best for them--that is best 
for them. I also support allowing and encouraging seniors to band 
together to use purchasing power to--purchasing clout to be able to get 
lower drug--prices on their drugs.
    Now, what you need to know is that a full Medicare drug benefit will 
take some years to phase in. And that's why I think we need to have a 
Medicare endorsed prescription drug card immediately for our seniors. 
The card will allow seniors to gain access to manufacturer discounts on 
the drugs they use as well as gain access to other valuable 
pharmaceutical services immediately. I talked about this last year. 
Court moved in there, and we're trying to get the court out of it. This 
is important for seniors.
    I also support proposals like the one the House just passed, that 
will provide Federal funds for immediate prescription drug assistance 
for seniors.
    Now, the key is to make sure that we expand seniors' access to 
programs that help them work with their doctors to use the best 
treatments too. And that includes better access to innovative disease 
management programs, like a program you have right here in Minnesota 
called Evercare.
    You should have heard the testimony I heard, one from a loyal 
daughter whose mom is now in the Evercare program and another from a 
customer of Evercare, about the need to use Medicare Plus Choice to fund 
innovative programs that allow for seniors to feel like they're not a 
part of some giant bureaucracy but in fact treated on a basis that you'd 
want to be treated on. And that's what Evercare does. And those are the 
kinds of innovations we need throughout our system, by giving seniors 
more choice in the system.
    While we strengthen Medicare, we must also encourage innovation by 
preserving our private health care system, the private health care 
system which is the envy of the world.
    In the report issued today that Tommy talked about, the Department 
of Health and Human Services says this: In countries which rely on 
Government controls to keep health care costs down--presumably to keep 
health care costs down--the patient suffers. And that's important for 
you all to understand and to know. And it's important for those who 
advocate Government control of all the health care in America to 
understand as well: The patient suffers.

[[Page 1174]]

    If you want a health care system where the patient doesn't suffer 
but, in fact, benefits, we must be innovative and encourage a healthy 
private sector.
    When Government determines which drugs are covered by health 
insurance, when Government makes those decisions, the invariable results 
are this: There will be delays and inflexible limits on coverage of new 
treatments. Costs might go down for seniors who are lucky enough to need 
the drugs that are on the Government's list. But as in the Canadian 
provinces and in many other countries, seniors who need drugs that are 
not on the Government's list would have no alternative to get the 
coverage they prefer. All seniors have to wait for the Government to 
decide what is covered, and that doesn't seem fair to me. And with 
prescription drugs, those delays can be life threatening.
    And the heavy hand of Government in other countries often does this: 
It discourages the costly and time-consuming investments in research 
necessary to discover new drugs. I want you to understand these facts. 
Eight of the 10--top 10 best selling drugs in the world were developed 
by American companies, while we can expect that 34 out of the 55 
breakthrough drugs entering the market this year will come from American 
companies. It is our companies and our researchers which are leading the 
world in finding the therapies necessary to save lives. And we've got to 
remember that. And therefore, we need to steer clear of direct 
Government controls that stifle innovation and limit a patient's choice.
    What's interesting is that more than half of our seniors have 
private drug coverage now because of their previous employment. And 
Government should act to strengthen these private health insurance 
options, not replace them. By relying on competition and patient's 
choice and innovative programs like Evercare, we will protect our 
seniors now and offer many new lifesaving services to seniors in the 
future and preserve our private health care system.
    When the founders of the Mayo Clinic started their practice over a 
century ago, they chose a clear principle to guide their work: The best 
interest of the patient is the only interest to be considered. That's 
the principle. Minnesota's immense and continuing contributions to 
biotechnology demonstrates that this is the right principle for our 
health care system.
    As Members of Congress act to provide a drug benefit in Medicare, I 
urge them to honor the principle I just outlined by putting patient 
control and patient choice ahead of Government control. If we do so, we 
can guarantee the continued vitality and productivity of America's 
private health care system, while providing the modern drug coverage 
that seniors so desperately need.
    And that's part of making sure we have a secure America. Health 
security is part of being a secure America. The other thing we need to 
do to make sure we secure--a lot of things we need to do to make sure we 
secure America--one is to make sure we continue to grow our economy. Job 
security is important for a secure America.
    But I want to just tell you real quickly about how I'm thinking 
about the war on terror, while I've got you stuck here. [Laughter] The 
war goes on. We face an enemy who is--they like to hide, and they'll go 
to the big cities in some of these countries and think they're 
invisible. And sometimes we don't hear from them for awhile. But you 
need to know, they're still plotting and planning. These are the ones 
that go into caves and send their youngsters to the death. They 
themselves hide, and get somebody else to carry on their mission, 
sometimes suicide missions.
    They're out there still. They still hate America because we love 
freedom. They hate us because we value the fact that people should 
worship freely. The more free we are, the more desperate they become. 
They like to find countries that are soft, kind of burrow in, and try to 
plan. And you just need to know we're doing everything we can to disrupt 
them. The doctrine still holds: Either you're with the United States of 
America and freedom-loving countries, or you're with the terrorists.
    We have over 60,000 troops overseas, 8,000 still in Afghanistan. As 
you know, Afghanistan is still a dangerous place. And we're going to 
stay there until a stable Government emerges, until we complete our 
mission. We're--any time we get a hint in

[[Page 1175]]

a place like Afghanistan, we're moving, and we're moving with some of 
the finest Americans ever produced, those who wear our uniform.
    This is a different kind of war. In the past, you'd see tank 
movements or airplane formations. This is like hunting down a bunch of 
coldblooded killers; that's what it's like. And that's all they are, by 
the way. And we're after them one at a time, one person at a time. 
We've--when I talked about the need for us to establish a Department of 
Homeland Security, I announced--part of my announcement was that I told 
the people that we had hauled in--``we'' being our friends as well as 
ourselves--hauled in over 2,400 of these terrorists. That's in less than 
a year's time. So we're making progress, one person at a time.
    Our goal is to get them on the run and keep them on the run, so they 
have no place to light or no place to hide. And it's going to take 
awhile. The American people understand that; that's positive. That's 
good news for us and bad news for the enemy. The American people 
understand that we've got a new challenge. Because we understand, when 
somebody attacks our values, the values we hold dear, it doesn't matter 
how long it takes, we'll defend them.
    I've submitted a bill, an appropriations request to the Congress, 
which is a significant increase in our defense spending. And I did it 
for two reasons. One is, I firmly believe that any time we commit our 
young into harm's way, they deserve the best pay, the best training, the 
best equipment possible.
    And two, it's a signal to the enemy and to our friends and allies 
that we're in this for the long run. There is no time certain as to when 
we quit. There is not a calendar that says, ``By such and such a moment, 
you've got to stop, Mr. President.'' For however long it takes, we 
defend our freedoms. History has called America into action, and 
America--America will act, because we're a nation that stands for 
tremendous values. We love freedom. We love freedom. And anybody that 
tries to take it away--[applause].
    I also want you to know this, that out of the evil done to America 
is going to come some good. I firmly believe that. I believe it. I want 
the youngsters here to understand, when you hear your President talk 
about getting them and rounding them up, that I yearn for peace. And I 
believe--I believe we can achieve peace. I believe that when this 
country remains strong and steadfast and resolved, we can achieve peace, 
peace not only for our own people but peace in parts of the world where 
people have never dreamt of peace in a while.
    That's the legacy this generation will leave behind: By being tough 
and doing what it takes to win the war on terror, we'll leave peace for 
our children and our grandchildren. I'll tell you what else is going to 
happen here, as a result of the evil done to America, there's going to 
be some incredible good here at home too. I believe people have taken a 
step back and asked, ``What's important in life?'' You know, the bottom 
line and this corporate America stuff, is that important? Or is serving 
your neighbor, loving your neighbor like you'd like to be loved 
yourself?
    I gave a speech at Ohio State University, at their graduation, and I 
was pleased to see that 70 percent of the seniors in the class had 
served their community one way or the other. They understand that a life 
in America is most complete when you help a neighbor in need, when you 
volunteer your time, that in America, being a patriot is more than just 
putting your hand over your heart and saying, ``One nation under God.'' 
It is a--serving a neighbor--[applause]--it also means loving a 
neighbor. It means mentoring a child.
    You see, in spite of our richness, there are pockets of despair and 
hopelessness and loneliness and addiction that we must address. The 
enemy hit us, and I believe they finally--they helped wake up a spirit 
of personal responsibility, a spirit that says, being an American means 
you've got to help a neighbor in need as well as saluting your flag.
    And it's happening in this country. It's happening. And I believe 
that out of the evil done to America is going to come a society in which 
the great American experience and the great American hopes extends into 
all neighborhoods, where people realize that they're fortunate to live 
in the greatest land--I mean the greatest--on the face of the Earth. And 
it's my honor to be your President.

[[Page 1176]]

    I want to thank you all. I want to thank you all for giving me a 
chance to come by and talk about an issue that's important for today and 
tomorrow, and that is quality health care for our seniors. And thank you 
for giving me a chance to be the President of the greatest nation on the 
face of the Earth.
    God bless, and God bless America.

Note: The President spoke at 2:50 p.m. in the Nicollet Grand Ballroom at 
the Hyatt Regency Minneapolis. In his remarks, he referred to Mark G. 
Yudof, president, University of Minnesota.