Carson Votes to Protect Seniors' Access to Doctors

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Carson Votes to Protect Seniors' Access to Doctors

November 19, 2009

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Congressman André Carson today voted to preserve seniors’ access to their doctors by fixing the way Medicare pays physicians. The Medicare Physician Payment Reform Act will permanently reform the Medicare payment system, repealing a 21% cut in payments to doctors scheduled to take place in January and replacing it with a stable system that protects seniors, preserves their relationship with their doctors and promotes primary care.

“Medicare is a lifeline for America’s seniors, and today the House took a crucial step toward strengthening this vital program and ensuring our elderly have access to the highest quality care,” said Congressman Carson.

This bill tackles seniors’ main concern – preventing pay cuts that could encourage doctors to stop seeing Medicare patients. It builds on the historic health insurance reform bill the House passed earlier this month, which will lower premiums, extend the solvency of Medicare by five years, improve preventive and primary care for seniors, and close the “donut hole” drug coverage gap.

To underscore the need to cut the deficit, the House attached statutory “pay-as-you-go,” or PAYGO, legislation to the Medicare Physician Payment Reform Act before sending it to the Senate. By joining statutory PAYGO with this legislation, Carson said he and his colleagues are making PAYGO more credible and effective – avoiding the need to waive it for current policies that Congress and the President have already agreed should be extended – and sending a clear message that House leadership is committed to fiscal responsibility.

With statutory PAYGO in place, all new tax and entitlement policies must be offset, restoring fiscal discipline and attacking national deficits. By enacting statutory PAYGO, Democrats are putting an end to the reckless borrow-and-spend policies of the past administration and the Republican-controlled Congress and reinstating the principle that took the country from record deficits to record surpluses in the Clinton Administration.

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