Washington, D.C.  -  As Congress advances the federal budget process for fiscal year (FY) 2009, U.S. Rep. Phil English (R-Pa.) is leading the charge in Washington to restore critical funding to the Medicare and Medicaid programs, which ensure seniors, disabled and children have access to quality healthcare.

The President’s fiscal year 2009 budget plan proposes to reduce Medicare and Medicaid spending by nearly $200 billion over a period of five years.

“It’s absurd that at a time when America’s working families are feeling the squeeze from the slowing economy, the Bush Administration has to put critical healthcare programs on the chopping block,” said English, a member of the Ways and Means Health Subcommittee.  “These steep cuts are simply in the wrong place at the wrong time and threaten access to quality healthcare for local seniors and kids.”

On February 4, 2008, President Bush released a budget that reduced Medicare by $182 billion and Medicaid by $17 billion.  Hospitals, which often serve as the primary source of care for Medicare and Medicaid patients, would face the lion’s share of the cut with a reduction of $135 billion.  Such steep cuts would have an adverse impact on the nation’s hospitals and health systems ability to provide high quality patient care and services.

“America’s hospitals care for everyone who comes through their doors twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.  Hospitals are not just a healthcare safety net for their communities, but also anchor local economies,” English said.  “By slashing funding for the hospitals that provide Americans with life-saving services and care, we not only run the risk of limiting options for families, seniors and the disabled, but endanger the good-paying jobs that health care systems provide in communities across the country.”

Today, English led a bipartisan group of 264 House lawmakers in a letter urging House Budget Committee Chairman John Spratt (D-S.C.) and Ranking Member Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) to reject the proposed cuts and ensure adequate funding levels for the Medicare and Medicaid programs in the FY 2009 Congressional budget. 

“Medicare and Medicaid are far too important to be the arbitrary target of green eye shade bureaucrats,” English said.  “Congress and the Administration must work together to craft a budget compromise that will embrace the priorities of working families, taxpayers and older Americans.”

 
*Copy of the letter follows:

The Honorable John M. Spratt
Chairman
Committee on the Budget
201 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 205 1

The Honorable Paul Ryan
Ranking Member
Committee on the Budget
B-7 1 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
 

Dear Chairman Spratt and Ranking Member Ryan:

We are writing to urge the Committee to demonstrate its commitment to Medicare and
Medicaid, and the seniors, disabled and children who rely on these programs for their care, by opposing proposed cuts to hospital services in the Fiscal Year (FY) 2009 Budget Resolution.  The nation's full-service community hospitals are the health care safety net for millions of vulnerable people, but face many challenges in providing this care: soaring demand, rising numbers of uninsured, new and costly pharmaceuticals and technologies, labor shortages, staying ready to respond to community-threatening events, whether natural or man-made . . . to name just a few.

Despite these challenges, the administration on February 4Ih released a budget for Fiscal
Years 2009 - 2013 that proposes unprecedented cuts: $182 billion over the next five years to Medicare, and $17 billion to Medicaid . . . a total of nearly $200 billion in cuts to services that patients and communities rely on. Under Medicare, hospital cuts alone would total a staggering $1 3 5 billion.

Among the many cuts included in the proposal: hospitals' Medicare inpatient and
outpatient inflation updates would be eliminated for the next three years, with updates lagging inflation every year thereafter; teaching hospitals would see their Indirect Medical Education (ME) adjustment cut from 5.5 percent to 2.2 percent over three years, a reduction of 60 percent; programs supporting hospitals that serve a disproportionate share of the poor and elderly would be dashed by 30 percent; and programs that are critical to America's rural hospitals would be seriously eroded.

We hope you will reject these proposed cuts in Medicare and Medicaid spending for
hospital services. We appreciate your consideration and look forward to working with you to achieve this goal.

Sincerely,

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