Bill seeks drug discount authority

Medicare program should be able to negotiate prices, lawmaker says

U.S. Rep. Dennis Moore is taking on Big Pharma, saying that the folks who run Medicare should have the same discount-negotiating abilities on drugs that General Motors, Ford or any other large corporation enjoys.

Or, for that matter, the Department of Veterans Affairs.

“Every senior in this country is a one-person buying group,” Moore said Wednesday at the Dole Institute of Politics. “When you’re a one-person group, you have zero leverage.”

And that’s just not good enough for a program that has 44 million beneficiaries, he said, all of whom could use a break on rising costs for prescriptions.

No doubt, said Genevieve McMahon, who was among the crowd of 75 government officials, Kansas University staffers, business leaders and others in attendance.

“It would be very useful,” said the retired educator, who is 87 years old. “I’m fortunate that my expenses are not high in that department – yet – but I’m getting old.”

While Moore isn’t alone in his quest, – another 150 representatives are sponsoring the bill, known as “Medicare’s Equitable Drugs for Seniors Act” – he acknowledges that he faces an uphill battle.

That’s because the bill would amend a law pushed for by President Bush, approved by Congress and signed into law. The law provides drug discounts for seniors, but prevents the Medicare program from negotiating its own price breaks.

Moore, as one of eight original co-sponsors of the bill, wants to follow the process established in 1992 for the Department of Veterans Affairs. That’s when the VA was granted permission to negotiate drug discounts on behalf of more than 20 million military veterans.

“This would be much simpler, and, I think, much more effective,” Moore said. “If you have 44 million people in a buying group, you should get a reasonable discount. That’s all I’m looking for.”