Why does one need a law degree to understand this...HHS’s 2018 and 2019 reimbursement rates for 340B hospitals were therefore unlawful. The text and structure of the statute make this a straightforward case. Because HHS did not conduct a survey of hospitals’ acquisition costs, HHS acted unlawfully by reducing the reimbursement rates for 340B hospitals.
Which part of that is confusing for you?
Which of those words are too big for you to understand?
Okay, let's walk through this. Xavier Becerra is the current Secretary of HHS, appointed by Biden in March 2021.
According to
The Epoch Times, the court unanimously ruled that HHS, which is led by former California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, illegally cut prescription drug reimbursements to hospitals by $1.6 billion per year in connection with a program that was established to help poorer patients.
[Why him? Cuz he's the current HHS boss ]
The decision is considered a victory for hospitals that serve low-income patients, the outlet reported, and will now allow them to seek the funds they were denied by Becerra’s agency.
The cuts were actually ordered during the Trump administration in 2018 and were defended in court
(WTF?) by the Biden administration, which argued that the cuts more accurately reflected the cost of hospitals buying the drugs and that the government was permitted to do so per a legal provision that gave regulators the power to order reimbursement adjustments.
The Epoch Times adds:
But HHS improperly relied on a formula that Congress made available only in specific circumstances, which didn’t apply in the case, the court determined. President George W. Bush in 2003 signed the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act into law. The statute requires HHS to establish reimbursement rates every year for certain outpatient prescription drugs provided by hospitals using a predetermined formula.
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that Democrat Joe Biden’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) violated drug reimbursement rules for low-income patients in a blistering decision that the media is largely ignoring.
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Reuters reported that SCOTUS justices overwhelmingly ruled in favor of hospitals that sued after HHS cut billions of dollars in annual Medicare reimbursements to a group of nonprofit hospitals that cater to poor and uninsured people.
SCOTUS overturned a lower court’s 2020 decision that the U.S. HHS had the authority to reduce by $1.6 billion the yearly Medicare payments for outpatient drugs that had helped subsidize the operations of hospitals catering to the poor and disabled.
SO - Trump's cuts in 2018 and 2019 were illegal but so were Biden's cuts in 2021? What about 2020?
Becerra comes in last year and doesn't change Trump's ruling on this issue? Did he not know the 2003 law? And the Biden Administration actually defended those cuts in court? WTF? One might think they would've reversed Trump's ruling and stopped those cuts instead of prolonging them.
Looks to me like both administrations were at fault here. In the overall scheme of things, $1.6 bil ain't that big of a deal, especially for lower income and rural areas.
americafirstreport.com
m.washingtontimes.com
