Senate Debate on Reform Begins Waiting Game

[This article posted on December 1, 2009. It is posted within the following categories: CMS, Corporate, via Michael Douglas, MD, MBA.]

Senate debate on the healthcare reform bill has begun. It did not take long in yesterday”s deliberations to see where the rift that defines each side in this debate falls: on the cost of reform. What’s interesting is that the partisan bickering, albeit civil, is based upon a gameplan of pure political juice involving data. That data, from the SBO (ironically in this entire quagmire, a nonpartisan body), are juicy low-hanging fruits from which the Dems and the Republicans know are worth the squeeze for all its worth. Over the next three weeks or so, each side will be extracting as much nectar as possible to drive home the point that health reform will or won’t raise premiums, ration care, increase the cost of care delivery, or take away a woman’s right to an abortion.

It’s a pretty heavy docket which should make for rather stimulating arguments for political junkies everywhere. Problem is, at this stage, it all feels blasé, if not anticlimactic. Certainly, debate on this issue is a necessary part of the political process to ensure passage of something, but the pragmatist in me senses that if Senate Dems could barely agree on getting the measure to a debate in the first place, the final version of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act won’t contain much in the way of change. How is Obama’s goal of change as it applies to healthcare a reality when the major political parties cannot even (or won’t even) agree on CBO data? Debate for debate’s sake is good, but in this case, it may be prolonging the inevitable — a final bill that is as historic as it is mundane. | LINK