On the recordOctober 31, 2011
on Friday a week ago, the Secretary of HHS made a very important announcement regarding one specific provision of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Secretary Sebelius announced the administration would no longer be implementing the Community Living Assistance Services and Support Act. The acronym CLASS applies to that part of the health care bill. She said: When it became clear that the most basic benefit plans wouldn't work, we looked at other possibilities. Recognizing the enormous need in this country for better long-term care insurance options, we cast as wide a net as possible in searching for a model that could succeed. But as a report our department is releasing today shows, we have not identified a way to make CLASS work at this time. This is not an ``I told you so'' speech, although it certainly could be. It isn't as though folks weren't raising significant concerns about the CLASS Act a long time before it ever passed. Two years ago, during the debate, Member after Member of the Senate came to the floor to argue the CLASS Act was destined to fail. Senator Thune led the fight to raise awareness about the fiscal disaster the CLASS Act has now turned out to be.…
