Sen. Schumer Discusses CBO Scoring For Health Care Bill

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) discusses the Congressional Budget Office's review of the Senate's health care reform bill.

Democrats Schumer, Brown Trumpet Merits Of Public Option

By John DuBois - University of New Mexico/Talk Radio News Service

During a news conference on Wednesday, Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) expressed their belief that a public option insurance plan would create competition in the marketplace and would lower healthcare costs for Americans.

Liberal Democrats, like Brown and Schumer, who support the public option have argued that the plan would help small businesses stay in business and provide health insurance for their employees.

Said Schumer, “Small businesses want to provide the coverage. They know it’s good for their workers, good for morale and good for keeping. They just can’t afford [health insurance] any longer and that’s why we need a public option.”

Brown argued that,“the public option will not use pre-existing conditions, [it] won't discriminate against women who have had c-sections or women who have been victims of domestic violence and call that a pre-existing condition.”

“We are changing the rules, we are also going to have the public option there to help those small businesses to compete to keep prices down,” he added.

Hoyer: House Health Care Bill Could Be Rolled Out This Week

By Meagan Wiseley - University of New Mexico/Talk Radio News Service

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) told reporters Tuesday that there is a possibility the House will introduce its health care bill by the end of this week.

“That’s our objective because we want to consider this bill next week. And we’ve pledged to give 72 hours notice so we need to roll out the bill this week,” Hoyer said.

Regarding the inclusion of a public option in the bill, Hoyer said he still believes the tax-payer funded insurance plan is critically important to bring health care prices down and to ensure access for all Americans, but added it is "just one component of a very comprehensive bill.”

Hoyer also said that he is pleased with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) announcement yesterday that the Senate bill will contain an opt-out version of the public option plan.

“I think our bill will be somewhat different on public option, but we are very pleased that Senator Reid is now talking about a form of public option,” Hoyer said.

ESPN Anchor And Author Nicholas Sparks Advocate Health Care Coverage For Childhood Disorders

By Meagan Wiseley - University of New Mexico/Talk Radio News Service

ESPN Anchor Hannah Storm and bestselling author Nicholas Sparks held a forum on health care and health insurance for childhood disorders today at the Brookings Institution, paying special attention to two childhood disorders: autism spectrum disorders and vascular anomalies.

Hannah Storm, founder of the Hannah Storm Foundation, spoke on her personal experience with vascular anomalies, or vascular birthmarks. Hannah was born with a port-wine stain birthmark on her left eyelid and below her eye.

“My parents spent their money and their considerable effort on a series of procedures throughout my childhood that actually left me pretty much like I was before,” she said.

“Although these outdated, and in the end, ineffective treatments were not covered by insurance, my parents made all the sacrifices necessary to get me treatment,” Storm added.

Storm said “time is of the essence” when treating these birthmarks. According to Storm, the insurance industry often views these procedures as cosmetic procedures, and often are not covered.

Nicholas Sparks also gave a parent perspective on his experience with one child with Autism and another who was born with a serious hemangioma, a self-involuting tumor of blood vessel cells.

He recalled the diagnosis of his autistic son, who underwent multiple tests before being diagnosed with the condition. Sparks said this prolonged diagnosis did nothing but cause his son to fall further behind in development than his peers. He said early diagnosis and treatment would have been the best way to treat his child.

Sparks’ twin daughters were born in 2001. One of the twins, Lexi, was born with a pencil eraser sized hemangioma on her neck. Over the next eight weeks of her life, the tumor grew. Sparks and his wife then took their child in for a surgical removal of the tumor. Six weeks later, they discovered another hemangioma that was growing inward toward her trachea and esophagus, which was life threatening. The tumor was removed, and Lexi’s life was saved.

“Despite these things I consider myself very blessed because we could pay for it...but that’s not most people. Most people lose themselves in the fear and that’s what we’re here for,” Sparks said.

In closing, Hannah Storm said, “the technology is there to help these children and their families, the resources are not accessible...often due to the fact that these procedures are denied out of hand because they are determined to be cosmetic and part of the issue lies in nebulous insurance codes, that is something we are trying to change as we speak.”

Boehner: Obama Administration Using Chicago Style Politics

Travis Martinez, University of New Mexico/ Talk Radio News Service

House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) Thursday accused the Obama administration of using “Chicago-style politics."

“The White House and Congressional Democrats know their liberal special interest agenda is not very popular," said Boehner during his weekly press conference. "This Chicago-style politics is shutting the American people out and demonizing opponents [by] launching vicious political attacks demonizing opponents.”

Boehner also invoked promises made during the election, wherein the Obama campaign promised to keep the creation of legislation transparent.

“The administration promised they were going to usher in an era of post-partisanship,” said Boehner.

The Leader also spoke on the recently released state by state unemployment figures from the Bureau of Labor and Statistics, which showed that 49 of the 50 states have lost jobs. Boehner decried a claim made by Speaker Pelosi in which she said the stimulus has created 2 million jobs. Boehner reminded the Speaker that California alone had lost 300,000 jobs.

Boehner went on to argue that the Speaker was “out of touch with what’s going on."

The Minority Leader also answered questions regarding hate crime legislation which is coming through the Senate, describing the measures as unnecessary.

“Sufficient laws are already in place," said Boehner. "The Civil Rights Act of 1968 provides ample protection."