Representative Heather Wilson: “I have been in this House a little over 5 years, and we have managed three times in the House of Representatives to pass…”

“I have been in this House a little over 5 years, and we have managed three times in the House of Representatives to pass a prescription drug bill. Finally, this year the Senate passed a bill, too, which gave us a historic opportunity to provide a desperately-needed benefit for the people that I represent, and the people that we all represent. The truth is that Medicare is stuck in a 1960s model of health care, a system that will pay claims instead of improve the quality of people's health. We have a health care system that had to be changed because it will pay $28,000 to amputate the feet of a diabetic and will not pay $29.95 a month for the Glucophage so that they can keep their feet. This system needed reform desperately because the people who rely on it need that medicine. That meant that we had to work hard to find the common ground that could make it through the House and the Senate. But it was about time. It was about time for a voluntary prescription drug benefit added to Medicare, supported by dozens of interest groups in this country, to provide some equity and some help, particularly to low-income folks who cannot afford their medicine and those who are very sick. That is what we did. This House as a whole and this institution will look back on this day when the President of the United States signed that bill as a tremendous change for health care for seniors in this country, and I thank God for it.”