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Senate agrees to consider health care reform bill
Published November 20, 2009 - BizTimes Daily
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The U.S. Senate today voted to move forward and debate a massive national health care reform bill.
The so-called Affordable Health Care for America Act has an estimated 10-year cost of $848 billion and is designed to extend health insurance coverage to more than 31 million Americans who lack it.
The bill would also prohibit insurance companies from denying coverage to patients with pre-existing conditions or denying benefits to patients who need dare.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) said the 2,074-page bill would cut the national deficit by $127 billion over the next 10 years and more than $600 billion over the next 10 years. The CBO estimates the bill would provide health insurance coverage to about 94 percent of the U.S. population.
The bill would allow states to opt out of a government-run "public option" that would be designed to provide competition to private insurers.
Today's vote to invoke closure and move the bill forward was approved 60-39 strictly along private lines, with all Democrats in the Senate voting for the proposal and all Republicans voting against it. Republicans said the bill would raise taxes and escalate the nation's deficit. Democrats said the Republicans are on the wrong side of history and the bill would enable the United States to join all other democracies in the world by providing near universal care.
Wisconsin Senators Russ Feingold and Herb Kohl joined their Democratic colleagues in support of the bill.
The Senate's full debate on the bill is expected to begin after the Thanksgiving break.
The House of Representatives approved its version of the bill earlier this month.
Under the terms of the bill, according to The Associated Press:
- Insurance exchanges would be created to allow individuals, most of them lower-income and uninsured, to shop for insurance coverage.
- Billions of dollars in tax credits will be created to help those earning up to 400 percent of poverty, or $88,200 for a family of four.
- Payroll taxes on incomes of more than $200,000 for individuals and $250,000 for couples would be raised.
- New taxes would be imposed on insurance companies, medical device makers, patients electing to undergo cosmetic surgery and drug companies.
Wisconsin Senators Russ Feingold and Herb Kohl joined their Democratic colleagues in support of the bill.
Editor's note: Reaction to the Senate's vote may be added to this report as it becomes available.
