House Passes the FFY 2025 CR
The House passed the FFY 2025 continuing resolution (CR) today by a vote of 217 to 213. One Republican voted no and one Democrat voted yes. The bill’s passage came together when House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-LA, and Senate Majority Leader Jon Thune, R-SD, committed that a Medicare physician rate fix would be in the budget reconciliation bill slated for May. The commitment was made to Rep. Greg Murphy, M.D., R-N.C., co-chair of the House Doctors Caucus. He and others threatened to vote no, which might have sunk the bill. Murphy says how far-reaching the fix is – overturning this year’s reduction, adding to it for this year, or a permanent fix – is unspecified at this time.
The bill next goes to the Senate. Democrats want to vote en masse against the bill, which would deprive the CR of 60 votes and sink it. But they also are weary of the political fallout of voting against the bill. The Senate Democrats would clearly be blamed for any shutdown now. The most worried are Democrats from seven swing states. They also argue a government shutdown could make the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) commission initiatives even more far-reaching.
We will see what happens before Friday.
Additional article: https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/regulatory/speaker-johnson-releases-funding-patch-six-month-telehealth-extension-no-doc-pay-fix and https://insidehealthpolicy.com/daily-news/murphy-gets-promise-doc-fix-will-go-reconciliation and https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5186882-government-funding-shutdown-senate-democrats/
(Some articles may require a subscription.)
#budgetreconciliation #governmentshutdown #cr #healthcare #trump #congress #physicians #medicare
https://thehill.com/homenews/house/5189141-house-republicans-pass-government-funding-bill
White House Says No Cuts To Social Security Or Medicare
The White House said today that President Trump was not cutting Medicare or Social Security. The clarification came after Elon Musk spoke about the need to examine entitlement spending. Out of fairness to Musk, his remarks clearly were in the context of fraud and waste. Of course, the media and Democrats jumped on the remarks and twisted them.
In other news, a good article debating how much fraud, waste, and abuse is really in Medicaid. Government estimates say it is nowhere what is needed to hit spending reduction bogeys as most of the improper payments are clerical errors. But outside groups, such as the Paragon Health Institute, say improper payments are much greater. Among the targets for waste could be provider taxes in Medicaid. See my blog Monday on that topic: https://www.healthcarelabyrinth.com/the-coming-debate-over-provider-taxes-in-medicaid .
Additional article: https://www.modernhealthcare.com/politics-policy/medicaid-waste-fraud-abuse
#budgetreconciliation #doge #medicare #socialsecurity #fwa #spending #medicare #medicaid
Health Tracker Examines Quality
The Peterson-KFF Health System Tracker examines various quality metrics. The healthcare foundation says measuring quality in healthcare is complex, which requires a vast number of metrics to monitor health system performance. Its chart collection examines five types of indicators: outcomes of treatment, provision of appropriate treatment, patient safety, preventive services, and health system capacity and workforce shortages.
#quality #healthcare
— Marc S. Ryan
