Overnight Healthcare: Hospitals plot attack against ObamaCare repeal

A powerful coalition of hospitals is previewing a fierce attack against GOP lawmakers if they choose to repeal ObamaCare next year.

The American Hospital Association and the Federation of American Hospitals on Tuesday fired off a damning new report warning that their industry stood to take a massive financial hit under the repeal of ObamaCare.

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The 41-page report, which was conducted by the firm Dobson DaVanzo & Associates, showed the hospital industry would lose $165.8 billion through cuts to Medicaid alone.

It’s the most high-profile study yet by a healthcare industry that’s fearful of an abrupt ObamaCare repeal after the surprise victory of Donald Trump last month. http://bit.ly/2gA6SkV

Meanwhile, insurers push Congress for stability amid ObamaCare repeal

Health insurers on Tuesday offered up a list of actions they’d like to see Congress take once the ObamaCare repeal effort begins next year.

America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), the leading lobby group for the insurance industry, acknowledged that “significant changes” are coming to the Affordable Care Act.

“Those changes can either begin a stable transition to a better approach, or they can bring about even more uncertainty and instability,” AHIP wrote in a summary of arguments it has been making on Capitol Hill.

One of the biggest worries for insurers is that Republicans will quickly pass a repeal of the law, but then delay it from going into effect for a few years to come up with a replacement. If Republicans pursue that strategy, insurers could flee the ObamaCare marketplaces, jeopardizing coverage for millions of people.

Insurers, therefore, are trying to get Republicans to take steps that would signal stability in the marketplaces in the period before any replacement for ObamaCare arrives.

Republicans are in talks with insurers about how to do that. Read more here. http://bit.ly/2g8lzKK

McConnell: ObamaCare repeal tops to-do list in 2017

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) officially said Tuesday that legislation repealing the Affordable Care Act will be the first order of business in the new Congress.

McConnell announced the agenda Tuesday, after meeting with Vice President-elect Mike Pence and Senate GOP colleagues over lunch.

“When we come back Jan. 3 we’ll be moving to the ObamaCare replacement resolution, the ObamaCare repeal resolution will be the first item up in the New Year,” McConnell said, referring to repeal legislation that is expected to pass with a simple majority vote under special budgetary rules. Read more here: http://bit.ly/2ghQGqI

Medicare looms larger over Trump-Ryan alliance

President-elect Donald Trump and Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) could be on a collision course over Medicare.

Ryan is defending his long-standing proposal to make the program more reliant on private plans, arguing such a change is necessary to keep Medicare fiscally sustainable.

But Trump said repeatedly during the campaign that he wanted to protect Medicare, not overhaul it. Vice President-elect Mike Pence reiterated that position on Sunday.

Given the possible resistance from Trump, and even from Senate Republicans, it is unclear how hard Ryan will push for Medicare changes next year, despite his clear desire to overhaul the program. More here: http://bit.ly/2h3kRAG

“It’s not going to be replaced come next football season”  

Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on Monday that it will “clearly take time” to replace the health law: “It took them about six years to stand up Obamacare. It’s not going to be replaced come next football season.”

That might not square with what some of his House GOP colleagues are eyeing for the replacement strategy. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), outgoing chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, rejected the idea of a three-year repeal bill during an interview with CNN on Tuesday.

GOP leaders, including Ryan, have not outlined a specific timeline on how long it will take to replace the bill, but lawmakers have said between one and three years.  

“I don’t like that at all. It needs to happen a lot quicker,” Jordan said about the three-year process. “We think the American people sent us here to repeal ObamaCare, not to take three years to phase it out.”

Did you miss it? The Hill hosted Tackling Diabetes: Solutions to a Complex Disease, sponsored by PhRMA. The conversation featured policy insights from Reps. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.) and Robin Kelly (D-Ill.), while health experts discussed ways to combat the public health challenge posed by diabetes. Leaders from PhRMA and AdvaMed rounded-out the discussion by focusing on type-1 diabetes, ways to manage the disease and the importance of finding a cure. To view the event video, please click here.

ON TAP TOMORROW

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) and Rep. Gene Green (D-Texas) will speak on biosimilars at an event hosted by The Atlantic starting at 8 a.m.   

WHAT WE’RE READING

Insulin maker Novo Nordisk vows no double-digit price increases (Marketwatch)

Life in ObamaCare’s dead zone (New York Times Magazine)

IN THE STATES

Texas children with disabilities caught in the middle of battle over Medicaid cuts (CBS11)

Vice looks at the only abortion clinic still open in the Rio Grande valley (Vice)

How Texas jails reduced suicides by almost 60 percent in one year (Texas Tribune)

Vermont is creating its own version of a health system that was abandoned decades ago by almost all states that had it – an all-payer system. (Governing Magazine)

ICYMI FROM THE HILL DOT COM

Senate names part of Cures bill after Beau Biden

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