Berkley offers amendment

Suzanne Struglinski

Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2003 | 9:03 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Money earmarked to privatize Medicare should instead be used to pay doctors, Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said late Tuesday.

Berkley offered a motion on the House floor that would eliminate privatization provisions from a pending Medicare prescription drug bill. Her motion also would block a 4.5 percent cut in funds paid to doctors who help seniors through the federal health care program.

She wants to use the money that would pay for the privatization efforts instead to fill current gaps in reimbursements to doctors and actually increase the pay-back rate by 1.5 percent for the next two years.

The House is set to vote on the motion later today. Although not binding if approved it would tell the House negotiators that a majority of their colleagues oppose privatization.

"The rapid growth of Southern Nevada has put a strain on the health care system and many doctors face a tough choice when it comes to treating Medicare patients because reimbursements are not keeping up with the costs of practicing medicine," Berkley said.

Berkley said that beyond just the day-to-day costs of staffing and rent, malpractice insurance for doctors in Las Vegas "has increased anywhere from 150 to 400 percent."

"We rely on these doctors to treat more than 150,000 seniors under the local Medicare system, but with the cost of doing business so high and the demand for their services at a premium, in many instances these doctors cannot afford to take new Medicare patients," Berkley said.

But Carl Forti, spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said the motion is just a "pure political move" since the conference is already done. "It's like me going back in history and trying to change it."

Forti wonders how Berkley will vote on the bill, since a provision in the report will help 11,089 community hospital jobs in her district.

"Berkley, like other Democrats, talks about the importance of jobs and the importance of seniors, but she would voting against them," Forti said.

Forti explained that language in the bill will put more money toward hospitals through the Medicare program.