Children Hospitals Could Pay Millions in Unneeded Drug Costs... Compliments of Congressional Error

by: Les Carpenter
Rational Nation USA

Could anyone have ever imagined that the highly competent inept Congress that passed ObamaCare would have let a mere 47 word mistake slip through? A mistake that could cost children's hospitals millions in additional cost.

The Boston Globe reporting (excerpts):

Partisan tensions on Capitol Hill are delaying efforts to fix an error in the federal health care law that could cost Children’s Hospital Boston and others like it millions of dollars in added drug costs.

Correcting the error would require changing just 47 words in the 1,880-page law, a task that a previous Congress might have accomplished in an afternoon. Instead, with Republicans fighting to repeal the health care bill rather than fix it and Democrats loath to acknowledge its flaws, months have passed with no resolution, and prospects for one in the lame-duck session are limited. 

“We’re using expensive drugs for really sick kids,’’ said Joshua Greenberg, vice president of government relations at Children’s Hospital. 

“What children’s hospitals are saying to the Senate is: This needs to be fixed, and it needs to be fixed this session.’’

One would think with all the legal experts in Washington that most certainly important legislation would be carefully poof read. Not just for gramme and punctuation but for accuracy of content. But then again we're talking about Congress now aren't we.

The error was a simple and unintentional omission in the final, frenetic days of drafting the landmark legislation and reconciling House and Senate versions. Con gressional staff intended to allow children’s hospitals continued access to the portion of a federal program that offers below-market prices on 347 specific medicines for rare, life-threatening conditions. But that language was accidentally altered. 

“It was a drafting error,’’ said a congressional aide familiar with the writing of the bill but not authorized to speak publicly.

 In business when a person responsible for insuring accuracy in documentation {so proper decisions can be made} commits an error of this magnitude they are held  accountable. Usually it means they get canned, fired, replaced. When Congress commits costly errors either nothing happens or they go into extended periods of  gyrating and delays, usually for political reasons.

Since this is a bad bill in the first place, and ought to be repealed maybe the delay into the next congress is a good thing. If  efforts are mounted to repeal the bill, and they are successful the whole problem goes away.

But until such time as it is either corrected or repealed it is costing hospitals millions in unneeded drug costs. All due to the inept execution by Congress and their staff.  And I guess that is the point of the article.

Read the rest here.

Cross posted to the Left Coast Rebel.

Via: Memeorandum