WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Senator Pat Roberts today was joined by Republican Leader Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and physician and Senator John Barrasso (R-WY) in warning the nation that Dr. Donald Berwick, the President’s nominee to be the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) favors health care rationing, which would further damage the quality of health care in America.

“I recently met with Dr. Berwick and had an opportunity to hear some of his thoughts on the direction he thinks American health care, and particularly Medicare and Medicaid, should take,” Roberts said. “I’ve also been reading up on Dr. Berwick, who has a prolific record of statements, speeches and books that further lay out his ideas for the future of American health care.

“And here is what I’ve learned: Dr. Berwick is a huge fan of the British National Healthcare System, called the NHS, a system that relies on rationing health care to hold down costs.

“Dr. Berwick has said, ‘I am a romantic about the NHS; I love it,’ and ‘the NHS is not just a national treasure, it is a global treasure.’

“In addition to rationing, the NHS utilizes an end-of-life pathway to death that many British doctors say leads to premature death in patients that could otherwise have recovered.

“Dr. Berwick’s ideas on end-of-life care seem to mirror this death pathway. He has said that: ‘Most people who have serious pain do not need advanced methods; they just need the morphine and counseling that have been around for centuries.’

“This is very similar to the President’s remarks about the elderly approaching the end of their life.

“The President has said that as you get older, ‘maybe you’re better off not having the surgery, but taking the shots and the painkiller’ instead.

“The President has also remarked that ‘the chronically ill and those towards the end of their lives are accounting for potentially eighty percent of the total health care bill out here...there is going to have to be a very difficult democratic conversation that takes place.’

“Well, it sounds like this ‘difficult democratic conversation’ has already happened in the United Kingdom, and that their pathway to death solution mirrors Dr. Berwick’s and President Obama’s ideas exactly!

“Age rationing is not the only way that Dr. Berwick has proposed for saving money in the American health care system. Rationing by region is another idea that should strike fear into any person living in a rural area in this country. I can foresee a time when the rural health care delivery system will consist of a band-aid and a bedpan!

“Dr. Berwick is the perfect nominee for a President whose aim has always been to save money by rationing health care.

“During the health care debate, myself and others tried to warn of the four rationing bodies embedded in the bill. These groups include: The Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute, the Independent Medicare Advisory Board, the CMS Innovation Center, and The U.S. Preventative Services Task Force.

“Dr. Berwick was actually Vice-Chair of the US Preventive Services Task Force until 1996; you may remember this as the body that recently ignited a firestorm by recommending that women wait until age 50 before they receive a mammogram- a recommendation that angered many women and their doctors in America.

“We also warned that Obamacare will result in higher costs, not lower.

“Well, our predictions are now coming true, and President Obama’s CMS nominee Dr. Berwick will be the man who cuts healthcare costs by putting Obama’s rationing plan into practice.

“So I hope that my colleagues will join me in carefully reviewing the statements of Dr. Berwick on rationing.

“I think you will agree that Dr. Berwick is the wrong man, at the wrong time, for the wrong job.”

Senator Roberts is a member of the Senate Committee on Finance which will consider the President’s nomination.

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