HLC Building Support for Bill Prodding CBO to Score Prevention Savings
Burgess-Christensen Measure Would Promote Disease Prevention, Wellness Programs
(The story below appeared in CQ on August 1, 2012)
Burgess and Christensen to Offer Bill Prodding CBO to Score Prevention Savings
By John Reichard, CQ HealthBeat Editor
The bipartisan duo of Reps. Michael C. Burgess and Donna M.C. Christensen said Tuesday that they’ll introduce legislation to urge the Congressional Budget Office to score programs that promote preventive care and wellness as producing budgetary savings.
CBO has declined to score such savings in the past, but the two lawmakers, both of whom are physicians, say there is now plenty of solid evidence that preventive care and employer programs to improve the health of employees actually do save money.
The lawmakers are circulating draft legislation to line up cosponsors and will be assisted in that effort by the Healthcare Leadership Council, which represents many leading health care companies and organizations.
“We are looking for a narrow, responsible approach that augments our existing budget law by directing CBO to provide information on the savings of preventive health, beyond the existing 10-year scoring window,” said a talking points document circulated by the Leadership Council as part of the effort.
“The current scoring process does not give Congress a complete picture, as long-term benefits from current preventive health expenditures may not be fully reflected, if at all, in cost estimates from CBO,” the document stated.
CBO now uses a 10-year scoring window. “Modern medical research has demonstrated that certain expenditures for preventive medicine are very cost-effective when considered in the long term, but the cost savings may be unclear when assessing only the first 10 years,” according to HLC materials.
The draft bill would allow the chairman or ranking member of either the Senate Budget Committee or House Budget Committee to request a CBO analysis of the two 10-year periods past the first 10-year scoring window.
The proposal would ensure that cost savings are tied to “real scientific data” by having CBO look at “credible and publicly available epidemiological projection models, incorporating clinical trials or observational studies in humans,” the HLC materials said.
Burgess, R-Texas, and Christensen, D-Virgin Islands, offered similar legislation in the last session of Congress that attracted 40 cosponsors. Only one, Burgess, was a Republican. Burgess said at an HLC-sponsored forum on Tuesday that Christensen has done a good job of lining up Democrats. “I need a few friends on the right as well,” he joked. “But it is common sense.”
As examples of things that could score savings, Burgess said statin drugs prevent heart attacks and the associated hospital expenses but CBO does not recognize that now. Christensen said there are proven ways of treating kidney disease that delay costly dialysis that also should be recognized as money savers.
“We could do so much more if we could score prevention,” she said, such as fixing the Medicare physician payment formula.
John Reichard can be reached at
jreichard@cq.com
