Frank Pallone: “If I could just take my time back a second, you remember that we have our Democratic Health Care Task Force, but the…”

“If I could just take my time back a second, you remember that we have our Democratic Health Care Task Force, but the Republicans had set one up also, and they had come forward at some point in the summer, early in the summer, with a patient protection bill that was very similar to the Patients' Bill of Rights. Some of the people on there had actually endorsed the concept of our Patients' Bill of rights. But when Speaker Gingrich got a copy of that thing, he immediately said, ``No way. We are not going ahead with this.'' He obviously showed it to the insurance industry and they said, ``No way, this is much too protective of the interests of the patients,'' and he told them literally, ``Go back to the drawing board.'' They went back, two or three more weeks, and they came out with this awful bill that they eventually brought up in one day. ... The CBO analysis, Congressional Budget Office analysis of the Patients' Bill of Rights of 1998, was it would have only a minimal effect on premiums, with most individuals paying only about $2 more per month for all of the protections that have been cited in the past.”