Yesterday, the U.S. Senate passed a bill that would get rid of the medical device tax, a provision within the Affordable Care Act. President Obama will more than likely shoot this down, though.
The original version of the bill, passed by the U.S. House of Representatives, still needs to hit the White House. The upper chamber voted 52-47 to pass the bill, two Republicans, Sens. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) joined Democrats in voting against H.R. 3762, the “Restoring Americans’ Healthcare Freedom Reconciliation Act of 2015.”
Previously, 61 attempts to roll back this legislation have been laid down by Republicans. This is one of the more promising attempts to repeal Obamacare if a Republican makes it to the White House.
“Republicans are carefully constructing a legislative strategy, based on Senate rules and precedents, to make it easier to unravel the health law in 2017 if a Republican wins the White House,” Politico reported. “Under the special rules of reconciliation, the Senate’s parliamentarian has to determine whether each provision complies with the Senate’s rules. Those rulings are based in part on precedent. So once the parliamentarian determines that this legislation complies, it makes it hard to argue that a similar repeal bid doesn’t in January 2017 – when a new president might sign it into law.”
The medical device tax when into effect in 2013. It says there is a 2.3% levy on all U.S. sales of prescribed medical devices.
In an attempt to dissent, a bill was created by Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), S. 844, the “No Taxation on Device Innovation Act,” but it currently has no co-sponsors. Its counterpart in the House, H.R. 1533 or the “Medical Device Tax Elimination Act” sponsored by Rep. Alma Adams (D-N.C.), has 10 co-sponsors, all Democrats.
We shall see how this rolls out.
A Deep-dive Into Specialty Pharma
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
Photo: Filckr user helen cassidy
