Norwood Claims Bipartisan Support For Health Plan Bill

“Rather than being a constructive step toward better health care, it is instead a worn-out measure that would hurt the very consumers it purports to help,” Young says.

The bill would establish mandatory internal and external appeals processes to determine whether a treatment plan were medically necessary.

In addition, the bill would mandate access to emergency health services, timely access to specialists and access to certain types of drugs and medical devices.

The bill would also bar health plans from restricting physicians’ advice to patients, using certain types of physician incentive systems, or retaliating against participants or providers who filed grievances.

Norwood says the provisions in his bill are supported by almost every returning member of Congress.

“This is a bill that should pass the House under suspension and the Senate by unanimous consent,” he says.

But Young says the bill would impose hundreds of new, duplicative federal regulations on health plans, throw out the insurers’ right to contract, and require insurers to rewrite millions of existing insurance policies.

All of this, he says, would require higher premiums.