An intelligent conservative and I are talking about the efforts in Congress to cap the price of insulin so I need a fair analysis or I’ll get fact-checked. Here are two points:
He says that he too is hazy on details, but says something about Republicans once offering to cap price at $10 and Dems rejected. Is this true?
Republicans offered a counter-proposal to the recent insulin price capping act that didn’t violate senate rules but the Dems rejected. True?
Can anyone shed light on these two points for me? Again, I need it to be a fair portrait even though the vast majority of us on the SD are liberals. Thanks in advance for your help.
If I had to guess, the truth will probably be something like, “insulin is $5, and by the way, trans people in concentration camps.” That’s how it usually seems to go.
Sounds like you should reply “Interesting! Could you point me to the bills in question?”
If they exist you might get lucky and someone here remembers exactly when, or have exceptional googling skill to take them past the hundreds of articles on the current house bill, but if they don’t it doesn’t much make sense for all of us to try to find them.
Any time someone says “party X proposed uncontroversial and universally acknowledged beneficial law but party Y said no,” 99% of the time it’s because the proposal was also attached to something else much less agreed upon.
“Oh, your party is for lower taxes? Then why did you vote against our lower taxes and increased puppy-kicking bill, huh? Guess you were lying when you said you wanted lower taxes!” smugness insues
On a sleepy Sunday morning, every single Democrat rejected a Republican amendment to provide insulin at $10 per prescription for anyone who is low-income (below 350% of the federal poverty level), including the uninsured. I voted yes because it was common sense. So did every single Senate Republican. Yet the Democrats unanimously rejected the provision.
There is no other reference given. The distinction seems to be the requirement of being low income, rather than a global cap. Also as others have said it probably contained several poison pills that Rubio neglected to mention.
I think I tracked down the ammendment. The news article that linked to it said that Democrats rejected it for being weaker of narrower. It too late at night for me to try to translate the legalese as to why this was a bad amendment but other Dopers are welcome to try.
Mr. KENNEDY submitted an
amendment intended to be proposed to
amendment SA 5194 proposed by Mr.
SCHUMER to the bill H.R. 5376, to pro-
vide for reconciliation pursuant to title
II of S. Con. Res. 14; which was ordered
to lie on the table; as follows:
At the appropriate place, insert the fol-
lowing:
SEC. lll. PROVIDING DISCOUNTED INSULIN TO
LOW- AND MIDDLE-INCOME AMERI-
CANS.
(a) I N G ENERAL.—There is appropriated to
the Secretary of Health and Human Services
(referred to in this section as the ‘‘Sec-
retary’’), out of any monies in the Treasury
not otherwise appropriated, $3,100,000,000 for
fiscal year 2023, to remain available through
September 30, 2026, for making payments to
Federally-qualified health centers for pur-
poses of covering direct costs incurred by
such centers for making discounted insulin
and epinephrine available to qualifying cen-
ter patients, as described in subsection (b).
(b) I NSULIN AND E PINEPHRINE A FFORD-
ABILITY.—
(1) I N GENERAL.—If a Federally-qualified
health center participates in the drug dis-
count program under section 340B of the
Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 256b)
and makes insulin or injectable epinephrine
available to its patients, such center shall
provide insulin and injectable epinephrine at
or below the discounted price paid by the
center or subgrantee of the center under the
drug discount program under such section
340B (plus a minimal administration fee) to
qualifying center patients through fiscal
year 2026.
(2) LIMITATION.—As applicable, the cost of
insulin and injectable epinephrine made
available to patients pursuant to this sub-
section shall not exceed the cost of such in-
sulin and injectable epinephrine pursuant to
the schedule of fees or payment under sec-
tion 330(k)(3)(G) of the Public Health Service
Act (42 U.S.C. 254b(k)(3)(G)).
(c) P AYMENTS.—The Secretary shall make
prospective quarterly payments to Feder-
ally-qualified health centers in an amount
that equals the sum of the following:
(1) The product of—
(A) the number of units of insulin fur-
nished to qualifying center patients in the
previous quarter; and
(B) the direct costs of procuring and mak-
ing available each such unit of insulin at the
discounted rate provided for under this sec-
tion.
(2) The product of—
(A) the number of units of injectable epi-
nephrine furnished to qualifying center pa-
tients in the previous quarter; and
(B) the direct costs of procuring and mak-
ing available each such unit of injectable ep-
inephrine at the discounted rate provided for
under this section.
(d) USE OF P AYMENTS.—Payments made to
Federally-qualified health centers under this
section shall be used for the sole purpose of
covering direct costs incurred by such cen-
ters in making insulin and injectable epi-
nephrine available to qualifying center pa-
tients under subsection (b).
(e) DEFINITIONS.—In this section:
(1) F EDERALLY- QUALIFIED HEALTH CENTER.—
The term ‘‘Federally-qualified health cen-
ter’’ has the meaning given such term in sec-
tion 1905(l)(2)(B) of the Social Security Act
(42 U.S.C. 1396d(l)(2)(B)).
(2) Q UALIFYING CENTER PATIENT.—The term
‘‘qualifying center patient’’ means a patient
of a Federally-qualified health center whose
household income is equal to or less than 350
percent of the Federal poverty line and
who—
(A) has a cost-sharing requirement under a
health insurance plan for insulin or
injectable epinephrine under which the pa-
tient out-of-pocket share is more than 20
percent of the total amount charged by the
center for insulin or epinephrine;
(B) has a high unmet deductible under a
health insurance plan; or
(C) has no health insurance.
(f) P REVENTION AND P UBLIC H EALTH F UND
O FFSET.—Section 4002(b) of the Patient Pro-
tection and Affordable Care Act (42 U.S.C.
300u–11) is amended—
(1) in paragraph (6), by striking ‘‘each of
fiscal years 2022 and 2023’’ and inserting ‘‘fis-
cal year 2022’’;
(2) by striking paragraphs (7) and (8);
(3) by redesignating paragraph (9) as para-
graph (8); and
(4) by inserting after paragraph (6) the fol-
lowing:
‘‘(7) for fiscal year 2027, $1,800,000,000; and’’.
SA 5386. Mr. COTTON (for himself,
Mr. GRASSLEY, and Mr. HAGERTY ) sub-
mitted an amendment intended to be
proposed to amendment SA 5194 pro-
posed by Mr. SCHUMER to the bill H.R.
5376, to provide for reconciliation pur-
suant to title II of S. Con. Res. 14;
which was ordered to lie on the table;
as follows:
In title VII, strike section 70001 and insert
the following:
SEC. 70001. FUNDING FOR THE DETENTION OF
SINGLE ADULT CRIMINAL ALIENS.
In addition to amounts otherwise avail-
able, there is appropriated to U.S. Immigra-
tion and Customs Enforcement for fiscal
year 2022, out of any money in the Treasury
not otherwise appropriated, $400,000,000,
which shall remain available until expended,
for necessary expenses of custody operations
for the detention of criminal aliens, as de-
scribed in section 236(c) of the Immigration
and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1226(c)).
I don’t think that last bit was actually part of the insulin ammendement that the Dems voted down. This was all part of a omnibus budget bill with lots of different parts, and I cut and pasted from the middle of a rack of ammendments on all sorts of subjects. The insulin part was an ammendment from Senator Kennedy while the immigration part was from Senator Cotton I think I just cut and pasted too far.
I just paid $35 for a 3 month supply at Costco. Not sure what happened there, but I wan’t going to call them out. Last month I beleive I paid $95 for a one month supply.
Thank You Joe Biden!
I know, I know. But the POTUS gets blamed for things he has no control over, so this is just as fair.