Big Effort to Lower Drug Prices Once Again in Congress Last year the House of Representatives passed major legislation to lower drug prices that included giving the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) the a ...
Update for March 20, 2021
House Passes Bill to Stop Cuts in Medicare Payments – but Senate Passage in Doubt Passage of legislation in Congress is more complicated than most people realize. The Constitution allows each chamber of Congress to s ...
Legislative Update: March 2021
Surprise! Congress Passes Legislation Banning Surprise Medical Bills Shannon Benton, Executive Director Last year, more than one-fourth of participants in TSCL’s Senior Survey reported that they had received a “su ...
Update for March 13, 2021
Using Generic Drugs Could Save Billions of Dollars A new study by the Journal of the American Medical Association says that the Medicare Part D program could have saved roughly $1.7 billion in 2017 if doctors and pati ...
Update for March 6, 2021
This week the House of Representatives is expected to pass the final version of President Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief plan, after which the President will sign it and it will become law. We will not go in ...
Update for February 27, 2021
Health Care System Weaknesses Magnified During Pandemic During the coronavirus pandemic, health care in the United States, or at least certain parts of it, has received more attention than ever before. As a society w ...
Update February 20, 2021
Medicare Pays More for Drugs than Medicaid Last week the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released a report that revealed Medicare outpatient plans are three times more expensive for the same drugs as those covered b ...
Legislative Update: February 2021
Will Our New Congress Pass a Benefit Boost? By Shannon Benton, Executive Director As our nation goes through the process of getting vaccinated for COVID-19 and getting our lives back on track, TSCL is working on a ...
Update for February 13, 2021
Monday Holidays This week most members of the House and Senate are back in their districts or states meeting with constituents or otherwise conducting business there. A few have stayed in Washington to take part in h ...
Update for February 6, 2021
Senate Finally Gets Organized Last week, the two leaders of the Republicans and Democrats in the Senate finally were able to reach an agreement on organizing the Senate for the next two years. An agreement was needed ...