Wisconsin State Senate Majority Leader, Republican Scott Fitzgerald (the "fitz" in FitzWalkerKochStan) has used a procedural maneuver to block a vote on a popular bill that would mandate coverage of oral anti-cancer drugs. Without that block, the bill would pass the State Senate.
Currently, injectable or infused chemotherapy is covered by insurance once the deductible is met. Chemotherapy taken orally (by pill), isn't covered the same way and often not covered at all because they're not on the list of "approved medications". This makes oral chemotherapy, becoming a highly popular way of administering anti-cancer drugs, unaffordable.
Oral chemotherapy drugs can run $120,000 a year, imposing enormous costs on patients whose insurance plans treat them as pharmaceuticals for which the patients must pay much of the expenses.
More than a quarter of the estimated 400 chemotherapy drugs in development are in oral form, according to advocates.
And for some cancers like some forms of leukemia and multiple myeloma, oral meds are the best drugs available.
The action by the Committee on Organization chaired by the Juneau Republican blocked supporters Wednesday from forcing a Senate vote on the bill, which would require insurance plans overseen by the state to provide coverage for expensive forms of chemotherapy drugs that patients take as pills rather than as infusions and injections.
Fitzgerald blocked the vote by scheduling — and then canceling — the second committee hearing in the last month on a bill that already had its usual public hearing last year.
Since this is the end of the Legislative session, the bill will likely remain unpassed. There are more than enough votes to pass it, too, since it was introduced by a Republican, Alberta Darling, and has the support not only of health care providers and anti-cancer groups.
Speaking to reporters Wednesday after the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported on the move, Fitzgerald said he believed the bipartisan bill would pass the Senate if it ever gets a floor vote but that he had used the procedural maneuver to give Republicans more time to decide if the bill should get that vote. He declined to say whether he supported the bill, saying it was a "tough issue" for Republicans on which there was little middle ground.
"It's a majority of the body (of senators supporting the bill) but not a majority of the Republican caucus," he said.
(bolding is mine)
Insurance companies hate it.
The Wisconsin Association of Health Plans has labeled the bill "The Oral Chemotherapy Mandate" and contends it "represents a government attempt to restrict the market."
Phil Dougherty, senior executive officer of the association, said it would set a bad precedent and would also be unfair to other patients taking expensive medications.
The real problem is not the insurance industry, Dougherty said, it's drugs that can cost up to $10,000 a month.
Yeah, they're using the "free market" BS on this one. If you're a cancer patient, fagedaboutit.
Interestingly, during the same time that this bill is under consideration, Republicans were trying hard to ram through a bill that would enable lobbyists to give campaign donations during the Legislative Session (currently illegal). Once the political stink of that measure, which some have labeled bribery for votes, was made public, Republicans changed the bill to make the dates lobbyists could provide checks earlier in the year.
Imagine having lobbyists for insurance companies roaming the State Capitol handing out payola to kill the cancer drug legislation.
Sen. Jon Erpenbach (D-Middleton), another supporter of the bill, said he was considering making a motion to yank the bill to the floor until he learned of the hearing.
"I think with certain GOP legislators, the insurance industry has more pull than people with cancer," he said. "I don't know how else to put it."
While this measure will only affect insurance companies Wisconsin regulates, it's crucial for cancer patients covered by those plans.
... the federal Affordable Care Act, often called Obamacare, resolves part of the problem by limiting how much out-of-pocket costs consumers can have for drugs and all other medical expenses to $6,600 for an individual and $13,200 for a family in 2015.
That doesn't help people who are fighting cancer right now and that out of pocket yearly maximum is also a budget buster for most working people.
Even if the bill clears the Senate, it faces tough opposition in the Republican dominated Assembly where no Democrat even has to show up for a quorum.