While legislators from each political party have their own perspective on how the negotiations behind the faltering budget plan to address the imminent $118 million Medicaid funding shortfall have gone down, health care providers and those in the forest industry say they are not focused on the “he said, she said.”
As Congress works to pass a stopgap funding bill this week, Wisconsin health advocates are keeping an eye on several extensions for Medicare programs providing telehealth services and rural hospital funding.
The funding bill House Republican leaders released on Saturday does not avert cuts for doctors who treat Medicare patients — a blow to Republicans who had pushed for the changes that also could risk alienating members whose support will be needed to pass the legislation.
Rep. Greg Murphy (R-N.C.) worries that if nothing is done to curb Medicare payment cuts to physicians, doctors will no longer be able to afford to run their own private practices.
The health care package would include substantial reforms to the business practices of pharmacy benefit managers, who negotiate drug costs, alongside an extension of eased telehealth and hospital-at-home rules. It also would impose new measures to fight the opioid crisis and prevent cuts in pay for doctors treating Medicare patients.