Political Quotes

“I want to speak to some of the concerns and comments that have been made by my friend and colleague from Tennessee with whom I have been working over the course of the last few days on this issue. There are a couple of issues he raised that deserve a response. First is the general notion that an appeals process, before going to court, is adequate in and of itself. There are two fundamental problems with that logic. Remember, the way the system works under both pieces of legislation is if an HMO denies care to a patient, they can go through an internal appeal. If that is unsuccessful, they can go to an external appeal. If that does not resolve the issue and they are hurt, they can then go to court. There are two reasons the appeal by itself does not resolve the issue. An HMO says to a family: We are not going to allow your child to have this treatment. The child then suffers an injury as a result, and a week later, or however long it takes to complete the appeals process, the HMO's decision is reversed by an appeals board. An independent review board says: Wait a minute, HMO, you were wrong to start with. Unfortunately, the only thing that independent review board can do is give that child the test they should have had to start with, but the child has already suffered a serious permanent injury as a result. The treatment no longer helps.”