Overnight Healthcare: Wounded Price heads toward confirmation | ‘Death spiral’ debate heats up | House panel to look at ObamaCare replacement bills

by Jessie Hellmann - 01/24/17 5:41 PM ET

Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.) appears on track to be confirmed as secretary of Health and Human Services despite a bruising confirmation process that has put his ethics under the microscope.

Democrats assailed Price on Tuesday for his trading of medical stocks as a member of Congress, putting him on the defensive, while accusing him of seeking to end Medicare and Medicaid.

Not a single Democrat has said they will vote for Price, raising the possibility that he could be the first member of President Trump’s Cabinet to be approved on a strict party-line vote.

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But Republicans praised Price, a former doctor, for having the “experience and qualifications” they say is necessary to lead healthcare through a new era under the Trump administration.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) on Tuesday accused Democrats of engaging in “partisan rancor” against Trump’s nominees. Read more here. http://bit.ly/2jbEaaj

Is ObamaCare really in a ‘death spiral’?

It’s a central part of the GOP argument against ObamaCare: The Affordable Care Act is in a “death spiral” and on the verge of collapse, Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and other Republicans argue.

Congress must act now to repeal and replace the law, the Speaker argues, because the system is already collapsing.

“You have to remember the law is in what the actuaries tell us [is] a death spiral,” Ryan said at a press conference this month. “So we’ve got to intervene to prevent this from getting worse.”

If the healthcare law is in a death spiral, it increases the need to repeal and replace it, since it suggests that health insurance markets will collapse without government action. That’s why it is a key argument for Republicans.

Yet non-partisan healthcare groups that have studied the law say that while it has some serious problems and faces challenges, they do not see it as collapsing into a death spiral.