Daily on Healthcare: Trump hands Democrats their 2020 attack strategy

TRUMP HANDS 2020 ATTACK LINE TO DEMS BY ASKING COURT TO STRIKE ALL OF OBAMACARE: Democrats credit campaigning on healthcare as key to propeling them to victory in the House during the midterm elections, and the latest action by President Trump’s Department of Justice asking a federal appeals court to invalidate all of Obamacare gives them ammunition heading into 2020.

The move particularly helps as Democrats are struggling to show they are united on healthcare. Some in the caucus favor the aggressive strategy of expanding Medicare and others believe it’s enough to funnel more money into Obamacare. Democrats have tailored their messaging to say they are united on achieving the goal of universal healthcare, and cast Republicans as determined to take coverage away from people.

The DOJ announcement comes at an opportune time for Democrats. Eric Hargan, deputy secretary for the Department of Health and Human Services, is facing the House Budget Committee on Tuesday morning (watch live), where the intent is to talk about the president’s budget but where he’s now expected to get an earful about the lawsuit. Later in the day, Democratic leaders are introducing a bill that would help to shore up Obamacare, giving them an early opportunity to show they are fighting Trump.

“Democrats will continue to fight relentlessly to protect people with pre-existing conditions and to deliver lower health costs and prescription drug prices for every American,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in a statement Monday night.

The Trump administration previously held, as the case worked its way through the district court, that only Obamacare’s rules on pre-existing conditions should be invalidated. Now, at the appellate level, it’s siding with the district court judge’s ruling that the whole law should fall as a result of Republicans zeroing out the fine on the uninsured in the tax law.

If all of the law were to be struck it would have more far-reaching consequences, including undoing the Medicaid expansion to the poor, reductions in what seniors pay for drugs, and allowing children to stay on their parents’ plans until age 26.

Good morning and welcome to the Washington Examiner’s Daily on Healthcare! This newsletter is written by senior healthcare reporter Kimberly Leonard (@LeonardKL) and healthcare reporter Cassidy Morrison (@CassMorrison94). You can reach us with tips, calendar items, or suggestions at [email protected]. If someone forwarded you this email and you’d like to receive it regularly, you can subscribe here.

URBAN INSTITUTE PREDICTS FALLOUT IF ACA LAWSUIT SUCCEEDS: The left-leaning Urban Institute in a study out Tuesday projected that if the Affordable Care Act were to be struck down fully then the U.S. would see a 65 percent increase in uninsured people and that federal spending on healthcare would fall by 35 percent. It predicts that demand for uncompensated care would increase 82 percent compared to ACA levels.

HOUSE TO MARK UP BILLS SHORING UP OBAMACARE: The Energy and Commerce Committee’s Health Subcommittee will mark up a dozen bills on Wednesday that are designed to shore up Obamacare and to lower drug prices. Absent are ideas to let the government directly negotiate drug prices, and even though Democrats have said that the drug-pricing bills are bipartisan, Republicans have said they have been left out of the process.

CONGRESS CONSIDERS GRANTING FDA MORE POWER OVER COSMETICS: Bipartisan lawmakers are looking to regulate shampoos, makeup, perfume, and other personal care products more stringently, which could result in having the government inspect factories and ban ingredients to ensure safety.

Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., are leading the effort. They are circulating a discussion draft of legislation to businesses and advocacy groups and expect to have feedback by the end of March. The Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy, part of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, scrutinized cosmetics ingredients with links to cancer in a March hearing.

OBAMACARE ENROLLMENT FALLS ONLY 300,000 — NOT THE MILLIONS TRUMP CRITICS PREDICTED: The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services reported Monday that total enrollment in Obamacare fell by roughly 300,000 people to 11.4 million for 2019, bucking predictions that millions of people would drop from the plans.

Monday’s numbers include data from the 11 states that, along with the District of Columbia, run their own exchanges, as well as previously released data from the federal government.

The Trump administration is calling the outcome “steady” compared to last year. The results defy projections from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office that said 3 million people who were on the exchanges would become uninsured as a result of Republicans undoing the law’s individual mandate, which imposed a fine on the uninsured.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION EXTENDS GRANDMOTHERED PLANS FOR ANOTHER YEAR: The health insurance plans, which are plans purchased between 2010 and 2013 and don’t follow Obamacare’s rules, have been extended once again so that people who are using them aren’t knocked off the plans they want and forced to go onto the exchanges. Former President Barack Obama used to authorize these plans to continue under his watch, and they have been allowed to remain under Trump. The coverage differs from grandfathered plans, which refer to those purchased before 2010.

SUICIDE TRAGEDIES FOLLOWING MASS SHOOTINGS ILLUSTRATE THE DANGER OF CONTAGION: At least three people who lost friends or family in school shootings have killed themselves in the last week, highlighting the effects of trauma and grief and the problem that news of suicides can encourage copycats.

Sydney Aiello, 19, and a second teenager who has not been identified, both of whom were survivors of the 2018 Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Fla., died last week from apparent suicides. Jeremy Richman, father of first-grader Avielle, who died in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in Newtown, Conn., was found Monday after taking his life.

“[E]xposure to violence is associated with increased risks for post-traumatic stress disorder, as well as other psychiatric disorders such as anxiety and depression,” said Dr. Yeates Conwell, co-director of the Center for the Study and Prevention of Suicide at the University of Rochester Medical Center. “All of those are also risk factors for suicide.”

Read more of Kimberly’s piece on the tragic developments here.

GEORGIA LAWMAKERS APPROVE GOVERNOR’S PLAN PAVING WAY FOR PARTIAL MEDICAID EXPANSION: Georgia state lawmakers on Monday approved a plan from GOP Gov. Brian Kemp that would allow his administration to pursue waivers on Obamacare. Georgia officials will now be able to go after possibly expanding Medicaid under Obamacare only partially, as Kemp campaigned against full expansion before the election. The Trump administration has yet to approve such a plan elsewhere.

21 DEM AGS FILE TO PROTECT OBAMACARE: California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, leading a coalition of 21 Democratic attorneys general, has filed an opening brief in Texas v. U.S., the case waged by Republican officials to invalidate the Affordable Care Act. The brief was filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, and argues that the plaintiffs have no standing because they face no harm from the individual mandate being zeroed out.

KY ANTI-ABORTION BILLS SET FOR COURT HEARING: Federal Judge David Hale, an Obama appointee, has scheduled hearings for Friday for Kentucky’s “heartbeat bill” banning abortion six to eight weeks into a pregnancy, and for another bill that does not allow abortion on the basis of disability, race, or sex. The judge warned the attorneys to avoid “intemperate language” when filing their briefs.

‘MIRACLE HONEY’ RECALLED AFTER FDA FINDS IT CONTAINS ERECTILE DYSFUNCTION DRUG: The maker of Leopard Miracle Honey, a sexual enhancement supplement for men, issued a recall Monday after the FDA found that it contains the active ingredient in Viagra. The product contains sildenafil, an FDA-approved drug for male erectile dysfunction. USA Less, the wholesaler that sells the “honey” in the U.S., advertises it as “an instant source of energy and enhancement of male vitality.”

VIRGINIA ENACTS FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE MEASURES TO LOWER DRUG COSTS: Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam signed into law Monday a measure that would lower patients’ cost-sharing responsibilities to decrease out-of-pocket drug costs. The law says health plan providers now must count copay assistance, including manufacturers coupons, to the enrollee’s cost-sharing obligations, creating extra-savings for patients on their prescriptions. Typically, when high deductibles have not been met, beneficiaries must pay full list prices for their prescriptions. Without this financial assistance, beneficiaries are more likely to put off filling prescriptions or ration their medications to save money.

MAINE TITLE X RECIPIENTS TAKE TRUMP TO COURT: The Center for Reproductive Rights filed a case Monday on behalf of Maine Family Planning, asking the District Court of Maine to block Trump’s “gag rule,” which would stop doctors from directly referring for abortions.

In the suit, the plaintiffs argue that the rule violates the Fifth Amendment by causing an undue burden to women’s constitutional right to abortion in Maine, violates the First Amendment’s Free Speech Clause by preventing medical professionals from speaking openly and honestly with their patients about abortion, and violates the Administrative Procedure Act because they say the change in policy was adopted without permissible justification.

PHIL MURPHY WILL SIGN NEW JERSEY ASSISTED SUICIDE BILL: The New Jersey Assembly and Senate passed a controversial bill Monday to legalize medically assisted suicide. Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy plans to sign it into law, which would make New Jersey the eighth state to allow the practice. The governor said that allowing terminally-ill and dying patients the right to make end-of-life decision was “the right, empathetic thing to do.” Patients Rights Action Fund, which opposes assisted suicide, said that society’s most vulnerable people, including the poor and terminally ill, will be the most negatively affected.

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Calendar

TUESDAY | March 26

House and Senate in session.

March 26-29. St. Louis. National Association of County and City Health Officials preparedness summit. Details.

10 a.m. 430 Dirksen. Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing on “Implementing the 21st Century Cures Act: Making Electronic Health Information Available to Patients and Providers.” Details.

10 a.m. 210 Cannon. House Budget Committee hearing on the Department of Health and Human Services budget. Details.

11 a.m. 1225 I St. NW. Bipartisan Policy Center event on “Tracking Federal Funding to Combat the Opioid Crisis.” Details.

2:30 p.m. Rayburn H-207. House Democrats to hold press event to “Protect People with Pre-Existing Conditions and Lower Health Costs.” Watch Live.

WEDNESDAY | March 27

March 27-28. Washington Hilton. Health Datapalooza. Agenda.

10 a.m. 2123 Rayburn. House Energy and Commerce markup of Affordable Care Act stabilization bills. Details.

THURSDAY | March 28

8 a.m. The Willard. Politico event on “Opioid Misuse, Hepatitis C and HIV: An Emerging Crisis.” Details.

TUESDAY | April 2

Time and location TBD. House Education and Labor Committee Health Subcommittee to hold hearing on surprise medical bills.