Appointment of Conferees on H.R. 5122, G.V. "Sonny" Montgomery National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007
APPOINTMENT OF CONFEREES ON H.R. 5122, G.V. ``SONNY'' MONTGOMERY NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2007 -- (House of Representatives - September 07, 2006)
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Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, let's make something clear: the Veterans Health Care Act of 1992 directs drug companies to grant discounts on all drugs that are supplied to the Department of Defense, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the Public Health Service, and the Coast Guard. These are significant discounts. On average they lower the cost to the government for pharmaceuticals provided to beneficiaries by 30 to 40 percent. The Department of Defense is able to take advantage of these discounts in its mail order program and in dispensing drugs in its military treatment facilities, hospitals and clinics.
But the pharmaceutical companies have been balking, refusing to grant these discounts to TRICARE beneficiaries. Those are the families of active duty members and families of reservists deployed. TRICARE beneficiaries, wanting to shop, understandably, with their local pharmacy, their local corner drugstore, they have not been able to obtain the advantages of these discounted drug prices.
The Senate has recognized the problem here and has acted to resolve it by simply providing that in the future, after this bill becomes law, the discounted drug provision will apply not just to military treatment facilities, not just to the mail order program, but to TRICARE beneficiaries going to private drugstores. And it should. Can anybody tell me a reason it should not? Can anybody tell me a reason that TRICARE beneficiaries, our military members, shouldn't be able to shop, when necessary, at their local pharmacy?
That is all we are doing here. The Senate approved this 92-0, and we are simply saying here, let us recede to the Senate provision, let us take a law adopted in 1992 and apply it to all aspects of military health care.
This has a couple of collateral benefits in addition to saving money. One is that the House provision, which raises copays for drugs purchased otherwise at military facilities, will not be necessary because we will save enough money here to make it unnecessary. Another is that the Senate provision, harsh I think, which requires mandatory mail order as opposed to local pharmacies, that provision too can be dispensed with because we will save enough money to do so.
This is a win-win-win proposition. There is no reason the House should not take up the logic and policy of the Senate bill and adopt this same provision. Every Member here should vote to instruct our conferees to recede to the Senate on this critical provision. It will save money and make life better for our TRICARE beneficiaries. There is no reason not to do it. There is every reason to do it. I urge its support.
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