WASHINGTON — Companies and groups hiring lobbying firms on health issues nearly doubled this year as special interests rushed to shape the massive revamp of the nation's health care system now in its final stretch before Congress.
About 1,000 organizations have hired lobbyists since January, compared with 505 during the same period in 2008, according to a USA TODAY analysis of congressional records compiled by the nonpartisan CQ MoneyLine.
Overall, health care lobbying has increased, exceeding $422 million during the first ninth months of the year, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks money in politics. That's more than any other industry and a nearly 10% jump over the same period in 2008. The center's Dave Levinthal said the frenzy of new lobbying activity makes financial sense.
"If lobbying didn't work, people wouldn't do it," he said.
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The vast scope of the health care legislation, which cleared a major hurdle Saturday when the Senate voted 60-39 to begin debating it, has spurred some to lobby for the first time. Gaylord Hospital in Wallingford, Conn., a 137-bed long-term care facility, decided it needed professional help after scrambling last year — aided by state lawmakers — to avoid losing Medicare payments, said Janine Epright, hospital chief financial officer.
"It was an eye-opener," she said of the Medicare fight. "We realized that we didn't have enough pull individually or as an industry to drive the process" in Washington. Epright said the non-profit hospital will spend about $50,000 on lobbying.
Others are beefing up their lobbying presence. Language Line Services, which has spent $90,000 on federal lobbying since 2007, hired a second firm this year as it pushed to boost federal funding for medical translation services. The firm, which employs 8,000 translators, says interpreters can reduce medical errors for patients who don't speak English.
The lobbyists arranged meetings between company executives and House staffers, said Marty Conroy of Language Line. The health bill passed by the House this month requires Medicaid to match up to 75% of translation costs, up from 50%.
The American Beverage Association hired a fifth lobbying firm this year as it worked to kill a proposed federal excise tax on sugary drinks to help pay for the bill. The group spent $7.3 million on lobbying during a three-month period, federal records show. That included $5 million on advertising to fight the tax, spokesman Kevin Keane said.
By comparison, the group spent nearly $668,000 on lobbying last year
So far, the group has been successful in keeping the tax out of the latest House and Senate bills.
But Keane said the group is not easing off its lobbying efforts yet. "You never relax until a piece of legislation, especially one of this magnitude, has reached the president's desk and you are not in it."
Interest groups have a lot at stake in health care debate
The effort by President Obama and the Democrats in Congress to revamp the nation's health care system by expanding coverage to millions of uninsured people and seeking to contain future costs is now in the Senate, but major issues remain unresolved. If it passes, industry groups that have spent more than $422 million this year lobbying on health care will have much at stake in the final negotiations with the House, which passed its version earlier this month. USA TODAY's Richard Wolf takes a look at how each group has fared so far and what's to come.
What they get: New patients would be added because of a mandate in the House and Senate that most people buy insurance. Both bills include billions of dollars in subsidies to help the uninsured. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates 36 million people would be added over the next decade in the House bill; 31 million in the Senate version.
What they give up: Their earnings per patient could decline as more payments are made on the basis of quality, not quantity of services, and as preventive care is stressed. Cost containment efforts in the bills range from pilot projects designed to compare the effectiveness of medical treatments in different regions to creation of a Medicare commission that could force votes in Congress to cut health care spending.
What's next: The American Medical Association wants a 10-year deal that would prevent annual reductions in the fees Medicare pays physicians. It would add at least $210 billion to the deficit over that time, something President Obama has vowed not to do, so it must be passed separately. The Senate voted down its version last month; the House passed its version Thursday.
Hospitals
What they get: Under both bills, hospitals would see 15 million new people on Medicaid, the nation's health care program for the poor and people with disabilities, as well as 18 million to 19 million more who receive tax credits to help pay for insurance. That means the number of uninsured people going to emergency rooms who can't their bills would decline.
What they give up: Three major hospital associations agreed with the White House to forfeit up to $155 billion over 10 years in Medicare reimbursements and other payments. Some of that would come from payments now made to hospitals serving large numbers of uninsured patients. The groups are the American Hospital Association, Catholic Health Association and the Federation of American Hospitals.
What's next: Hospitals won a 10-year exemption in the Senate bill from any additional Medicare reductions that might be recommended by a new advisory board to force cost-cutting action by Congress. The House bill does not include such an advisory board so this issue will issue will be resolved by congressional negotiators.
Source:usatoday.com
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