George Voinovich: “I thank my friends from Maine and Nebraska for offering this important amendment. I believe the Collins-Nelson amendment…”

“I thank my friends from Maine and Nebraska for offering this important amendment. I believe the Collins-Nelson amendment will allow the Senate to move forward and pass a strong Federal patient protection bill without suffocating the patient protections States have adopted over the last several years. I wholeheartedly agree that the Senate should take action to protect those Americans not covered under state plans. While the states were in front protecting the majority of those insured individuals through state regulation, the federal government has dragged its feet. However, a federal patient's bill of rights should not preempt the patient protections that have already been passed by the states. There are more than 117 million Americans who are covered under fully insured plans, governmental plans and individuals policies, which are all regulated under state law. My colleagues supporting the McCain-Kennedy legislation believe that the federal mandates in the bill should apply not only to ERISA plans, but also to those 117 million Americans in state regulated health plans. Apparently, they do not think that the states, which have already acted and are already protecting millions of Americans, are competent enough to do the job. Instead, they think that the federal government will do a much better job.”