Don Nickles: “The Senator can answer the question. I have the floor and I will state again, some States lose under the Senator's…”

“The Senator can answer the question. I have the floor and I will state again, some States lose under the Senator's proposal big time. I am not sure all States do; some States lose big time. The Senator stated that he did not have a State-by-State analysis, so every fact that is on this chart may well be accurate. The Senator also stated that CBO did not do a State-by-State analysis, and I will say if we are going to be changing Medicaid formulas, or if we are going to be changing Medicaid programs and States have to make a certain percentage match, it is only prudent that we would do an analysis of what the impact would be on a State-by-State basis. Unfortunately, CBO did not do that. Fortunately, the Department of HHS did. The States that are included on this list are the States that get hit the hardest, and we expose that. Now, there may be some offsets, but I tell my colleague from Florida, I can almost assure him, since 80 percent of seniors have prescription drug costs that are $2,000 or less, that catastrophic program savings would not come near to offset the increased costs of utilization.”