Asia-Pacific
US Senate conducts vote marathon on healthcare
(Agencies)
Updated: 2010-03-25 09:59
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'Fix it'
"This is called a fix-it bill. We're suggesting you fix it," said Judd Gregg, the ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, rejecting Democratic claims that sending the bill back to the House would be a death sentence.
"That is absurd," Gregg said. "We have suggested a series of amendments that will significantly improve this bill."
The package of changes to the healthcare overhaul, approved in the House on Sunday, include an expansion of subsidies to make insurance more affordable and more state aid for the Medicaid program for the poor.
It also would eliminate a controversial Senate deal exempting Nebraska from paying for Medicaid expansion costs, close a "doughnut hole" in prescription drug coverage and modify a January deal on a tax on high-cost insurance plans.
The final package would extend taxes for Medicare, the federal health insurance program for the elderly and disabled, to unearned income. It also includes reform of the student loan program.
The overhaul signed by Obama represents the biggest changes to the health system in four decades. It expands insurance coverage to 32 million Americans and imposes new insurance regulations like barring companies from refusing to cover patients with pre-existing medical conditions.
The health insurance industry has been critical of the plan, but the Morgan Stanley Healthcare Payor index of health insurers has risen about 1 percent since passage as investors were encouraged that clarity on health reform was near and the bill avoided worst-case scenarios.
The contentious healthcare debate in the House still echoed in the Capitol. House Democratic leaders met with Capitol law enforcement officials to discuss security after death threats and acts of violence against lawmakers accompanied the weekend vote.
Bricks were tossed through the windows of one member's office, while another lawmaker was spat at by a protester on Capitol Hill and another was the target of a racial slur.
The FBI said it was investigating the threats, and Democrats called on Republicans to reject them.
"It's more disturbing to me that Republican leadership has not condemned these attacks and instead appears to be fanning the flames with coded rhetoric," said House Rules Committee Chairwoman Louis Slaughter.
Obama signed an executive order reaffirming a ban on using federal funds to pay for abortions, part of a deal with about a half-dozen anti-abortion House Democrats that won their support for the healthcare bill.
