Frank Pallone

The Affordable Care Act began to make improvements to our healthcare system through delivery system reforms that improve both efficiency and quality.

For the past 4 years, the Republican budget proposals have turned Medicare into a voucher program and turned Medicaid into block grants.

I do not agree that we need to balance the budget on the backs of our safety net programs.

I think everyone here would agree that the goals of the ABLE Act are worthy. The bill's title stands for achieving better life experience, and it would allow for the creation of tax-free savings accounts to benefit individuals with…

I just wanted to mention that in formal responses to the Energy and Commerce Committee and the Senate Finance Committee, governors from 39 states expressed support for CHIP, and urged Congress to extend the program.

I hope we can see Congress implement this commonsense MACPAC recommendation and protect low-income children from losing coverage as a result of unaffordable premiums.

The coverage needs to be affordable, both when you go to the doctor, and also in the amount of money you have to pay to keep insured.

I believe that MACPAC has examined this issue, and could you tell us what you have found?

Thank you. I wanted to ask Dr. Schwartz, in the CHIP reauthorization legislation in 2009, Congress gave states the new option to reduce bureaucracy and help make the Medicaid and CHIP enrollment process easier, called express lane…

I want to also take a moment to honor one of the original authors of the CHIP program, Senator Jay Rockefeller, who is retiring this year.

I strongly support an additional 4 years of funding for the CHIP program.

I certainly have appreciated working with you. It has been very easy to work with you on a bipartisan basis.

While it is clear we should do more to encourage greater research in development of new drugs, it also makes sense that we should be investing in efforts to limit the further spread of drug resistant bacteria strains and make the best use…

Yet, there are some ideas that are worth further examination, such as the ADAPT Act introduced by Congressmen Green and Gingrey.

In 2006, in my State of New Jersey, a 17-year-old honor student named Rebecca Lohsen went to the hospital and within days died from a resistant strain of MRSA.

I have no further speakers at this time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I have no additional speakers at this time. I urge passage of the bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I have no other speakers at this time, and so I yield back the balance of my time.

The ACLA claims that once a manufacturer gets a test approved, it never improves it because of fear of needing new approval.

Presumably, all sides would agree that there should be enough oversight of tests to ensure that they are accurate and clinically relevant, but the oversight should not be so burdensome as to prevent or unnecessarily delay the development…

Identifying the HER2/neu gene in patients allowed oncologists to target this unique form of breast cancer with the drug Herceptin, instead of radiation, vastly improving patient outcomes.

This is why we have regulation, and it is why the FDA has proposed commonsense changes that merely bring safety regulations up-to-speed with medical progress.

New technologies and advances in medicine can improve the quality of life for millions of Americans, but the use of these advances can also pose serious risks to individual patients if they are not clinically accurate.

Advances in science and technology have enabled labs to develop more sophisticated tests that allow physicians to identify genetic factors in diagnosing disease.

The TELE-MED Act improves seniors' access to care by permitting Medicare providers to treat patients electronically across state lines.