Top Healthcare Policy News from the Week of December 9th
Hospitals | Price Transparency
Hospitals Sue Trump, Want to Block Price-Transparency Rule
As we all expected, hospitals sued the Trump administration over the contentious price transparency rule, under which they would be forced to disclose how much insurance companies pay them for healthcare services.
The arguments.
The hospital defense: Revealing negotiated rates made between the hospital and the insurer will confuse patients, take a large financial toll on hospital IT departments retrieving the data, and hurt competition by potentially causing collusion – or even higher prices when certain hospitals see they’re getting underpaid.
- There’s even a free speech argument: is the forced disclosure of highly confidential prices in a business operation a violation of that company’s free speech?
Re-calibrate yourself: Remember that HHS tried to pass a similar law with drug prices earlier this year, which would have required drugmakers to disclose list prices of drugs on TV commercials for any medication over $35.
A judge struck down that rule, saying that HHS didn’t have the proper authority to impose that kind of regulation – so who knows if HHS has the authority over hospitals and this ruling, either.
- From Seema Verma’s Op-Ed in the Chicago Tribune, she thinks the hospitals’ arguments are pretty weak and advocates for transparency.
What do you think?
Regulatory | Drug Policy
U.S. Considers Easing Drug Protections to Break Logjam Over Trade Pact
WSJ reported (paywall) this week that the Trump administration is “considering scaling back intellectual-property protections for big drug-makers to help win Democratic support for a new trade pact with Mexico and Canada.”
Why this matters.
A big way that drug-makers maintain revenue growth and margins is through enjoying exclusive rights to the drugs they develop for a number of years.
- That exclusivity period might shrink if this proposal is included in the new NAFTA trade pact, which would affect profitability.
Other drug stuff to know:
- FDA Head Approved: The Senate panel approved Stephen Hahn, Trump’s FDA head nominee. Next up: a full Senate floor vote.
- Pelosi Update: The White House thinks Nancy Pelosi’s drug pricing proposal (read about it here) would cost $1 trillion annually and stifle the development of up to 100 drugs per year. Breaking: the plan isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
Policy | Medicaid
Medicaid Work Requirement Delayed Everywhere
State lawmakers are either delaying or cancelling Medicaid work requirements everywhere – Indiana, Virginia, New Hampshire, Michigan, Montana, and Arizona – just to name a few states.
As it turns out, it’s far more costly to track whether or not people are in compliance than it is to just give them Medicaid benefits.
- You should also know: legal challenges are mounting against Medicaid work requirements, which is also partly why several states suspended their programs for the time being.
Policy | 2020 Election
Latest 2020 Healthcare Election News
- From the Warren Camp: How a fight over healthcare entangled Elizabeth Warren and reshaped the Democratic race
- The Voice of the People: Do voters really want all of the focus to be on healthcare in 2020?
- Finders, Keepers: Joe Biden thinks Pete Buttigieg, who has surged in popularity in recent months, stole his healthcare plan.
- Say Bye Bye, Kamala: The California Democrat dropped out of the running this week. That means one less healthcare policymaker to track for me.
- Racist Algorithms: Cory Booker wants the FTC to look into biased healthcare algorithms.
- Rural Health: Is it becoming a major 2020 campaign issue?
That’s all for healthcare policy this week. Save yourself some time – Subscribe to our all-in-one healthcare newsletter to stay on top of the latest healthcare news.