Democrats Stymied in Push for Lower Drug Costs

April 18, 2007

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April 18, 2007

Democrats couldn't muster the 60 votes needed to get the Senate to consider whether the federal government, as well as private insurers, should be allowed to negotiate cheaper drugs under Medicare. That makes it a bit harder to deliver on election promises.

MICHELE NORRIS, host:

In the battle for control of Congress last year, a top campaign promise for Democrats the new Medicare prescription drug program. Lawmakers vow to let the deferral program. The federal government negotiate lower drug prices. The house voted to do that in January. But today, Senate Republicans blocked the plan.

NPR's Julie Rovner has the story.

JULIE ROVNER: Democrats now running Congress say they want to keep the Republican-authored Medicare prescription drug program; they just want to make some changes, like lifting the ban on government negotiations. Montana Democratic Senator Max Baucus is one of the few Democrats who supported the original Medicare drug law when it passed in 2003, and he sponsored what he hoped would be the Senate compromise measure this week.

Senator MAX BAUCUS (Democrat, Montana): We should not allow the government to sit idly by while seniors continue to pay high prices, maybe go without their medicine. That'd be a dereliction of duty.

ROVNER: But Republicans like Iowa senator Chuck Grassley, who partnered with Baucus to create the Medicare law, vehemently oppose lifting the ban on government negotiations. Grassley said the bill would inevitably lead to government price controls on medicines.

Senator CHUCK GRASSLEY (Republican, Iowa): We have reams of evidence showing that price controls in Medicare will lead to higher drug costs for everybody else. That means higher prices for veterans, that means higher prices for the disabled, pregnant women, children on Medicaid, that means higher prices for small business owners and families. We can and should stop this bill in its tracks.

ROVNER: Public opinion polls show large majorities of Americans support letting the federal government bargain for lower Medicare drug prices, in addition to the private plans that do the bargaining now. And in January, the House easily passed a bill that would not only allow but require the Secretary of Health and Human Services to bargain for better prices. But this morning, only six Republicans crossed party lines to vote with Senate Democrats.

That left the bill five votes short of the 60 required to move one more step towards a vote. Maine Republican Olympia Snowe was one of those Republicans. She called today's outcome unfortunate.

Senator OLYMPIA SNOWE (Republican, Maine): Because I think we had an opportunity here to achieve savings, and not continue to subsidize higher prices for the pharmaceutical industry, frankly.

ROVNER: Oregon Democratic Senator Ron Wyden, who's been working with Snowe on a bill to allow the government to negotiate since the law was first passed in 2003, says Republicans are misconstruing the effort.

Senator RON WYDEN (Democrat, Oregon): We weren't seeking to replace the private plan. We weren't seeking to have price controls or restrictive list of drugs seniors could get, and what we have seen today is a special interest group once again overreaching.

ROVNER: That was a reference to the drug industry, which spent millions of dollars lobbying against the bill. But Republicans like John Kyl of Arizona said that had nothing to do with their opposition.

Senator JOHN KYL (Republican, Arizona): I know what I did to analyze my vote, okay? And I didn't talk to a single drug company about it. And I decided on my own how I was going to vote, and frankly, I think my argument is persuasive, and the other side does not have very good arguments.

ROVNER: Backers of the bill insist it's not yet dead, that once Medicare patients start seeing drug prices go up, they'll demand Congressional action. But President Bush has vowed to veto the measure. So even Senate passage makes any actual policy change unlikely.

Julie Rovner, NPR News, Washington.

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