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Health Care: Increasing
Access and Improving the Nation's Health
Enacted Most Comprehensive Medicare Reforms in History. In the
1997 Balanced Budget, the Clinton-Gore Administration protected, modernized and
extended the life of the Medicare Trust Fund while offering new options for
patient choice and preventive care. New preventive benefits passed include
coverage of annual mammograms, coverage of screening tests for both colorectal
and cervical cancer, and a diabetes self-management benefit. The President
proposed a plan to reform and modernize Medicare's benefits, including an
optional prescription drug benefit that is affordable and available to all
beneficiaries. The President has also proposed a reserve fund to help Medicare
beneficiaries with extremely high prescription drug costs. [White House at
Work, 8/8/97; National Economic Council/Domestic Policy Committee, 7/2/99]
Extending the Life of the Medicare Trust Fund. When President
Clinton and Vice President Gore took office, Medicare was expected to run out
of money in 1999. Now, the life of the Trust Fund has been extended until 2023.
Medicare is now in the soundest shape it has been since 1975. [HHS Press
Release, 3/30/00]
Enacted Single Largest Investment in Health Care for Children since
1965. The five year, $24 billion State Children's Health Insurance
Program (SCHIP) will provide health care coverage for up to five million
children. Two million children have already been enrolled, and in October 1999
President Clinton announced new outreach initiatives to enroll millions more
uninsured, eligible children. Last year, the President launched a nationwide
"Insure Kids Now" campaign that will bring together major TV and radio
networks, healthcare organizations, religious groups and other community-based
organizations to help enroll more children in the Children's Health Insurance
Program, with the goal of enrolling 5 million of the estimated 10 million
children eligible for health insurance under CHIP within 5 years. This year,
the budget includes several of Vice President Gore's proposals to accelerate
enrollment of children in CHIP. The President is also proposing a new
FamilyCare program, which would give States the option to cover parents in the
same plan as their children. [White House Fact Sheet, 1/11/00; White House,
2/23/99]
Passed Meaningful Health Insurance Reform. The President signed
into law the Kennedy-Kassebaum Health Insurance Portability and Accountability
Act, which helps individuals keep health insurance when they change jobs,
guarantees renewability of coverage, and ensures access to health insurance for
small businesses. As many as 25 million people will benefit from this law. The
bill also eliminated the discriminatory tax treatment the of the approximately
10 million Americans who are self-employed; strengthened efforts to combat
health care fraud, waste and abuse by creating a stable source of funding; and
provided consumer protections and tax incentives for private long-term care
insurance. [FY 2000 Budget, p. 83; Domestic Policy Council]
Enacted Historic Comprehensive FDA Reform that Expedited the Review
and Approval of New Drug Products. The President signed into law the 1997
FDA Modernization Act that includes important measures to modernize and
streamline the regulation of biological products; increase patient access to
experimental drugs and medical devices; and accelerate review of important new
medications. This reform builds on the administrative initiatives implemented
under the Vice President's reinventing government effort which have led
U.S. drug approvals to be as fast or faster than any other industrialized
nation. Average drug approval times have dropped since the beginning of the
Administration from almost three years to just over one year. [Domestic Policy
Council]
Signed Mental Health Parity Provisions into Law. To help
eliminate discrimination against individuals with mental illnesses, the
President signed into law mental health parity provisions to prohibit health
plans from establishing separate lifetime and annual limits for mental health
coverage. In 1999, the White House held the landmark, first-ever Conference on
Mental Health and released the Surgeon General's first Report on Mental
Health. This year, the President's budget includes an investment of $100
million for mental health services, an increase of 16 percent over last
year's funding level and a 90 percent increase since 1993. [Presidential
Statement, 9/26/96]
Signed Legislation to End Drive-Through Deliveries. President
Clinton signed into law common sense legislation that requires health plans to
allow new mothers to remain in the hospital for at least 48 hours following
most normal deliveries and 96 hours after a Cesarean section. [Presidential
Statement, 9/26/96]
Extended Strong, Enforceable Patient Protections for Millions of
Americans. Leading by example, the President directed all federal agencies
to ensure that their employees and beneficiaries have the benefits and rights
guaranteed under the proposed Patients' Bill of Rights. 85 million
Americans covered by federal health plans have the security of knowing they
will have fair access to health care thanks to the President's work. The
President and Vice President have called for passage of the bipartisan Patients
Bill of Rights Act, to ensure that all Americans have essential protections,
such as guaranteed access to needed health care specialists; access to
emergency room services when and where the need arises; continuity of care
protections to assure patient care if a patient's health care provider is
dropped; access to a timely internal and independent external appeals process
with a medical necessity standard; assurance that doctors and patients can
openly discuss treatment options; and an enforcement mechanism that ensures
recourse for patients who have been harmed as a result of health plan actions.
[FY 2000 Budget, p. 85]
Fighting Medicare Fraud and Waste. Since 1993, the Clinton-Gore
Administration has assigned more federal prosecutors and FBI agents to fight
health care fraud than ever before. As a result, convictions have gone up a
full 410 percent, saving more than $50 billion in health care claims. The
Balanced Budget Act gave an array of new weapons in our fight to keep scam
artists and fly-by-night health care out of Medicare and Medicaid. [Domestic
Policy Council, Health Care Achievements]
Increasing the Participation of Seniors in Clinical Trials.
President Clinton signed an executive memorandum directing Medicare to
begin covering all the routine medical costs of participation in a clinical
trial, removing a major barrier to seniors' participation in these trials.
These actions, strongly advocated by the Vice President and initiated through
his leadership, follow a recent Institute of Medicine report recommending
policy changes to encourage greater use of clinical trials by older Americans
and the completion of a review of Administration policy. With the fast pace of
medical advancement and continuing efforts to make evidence based medical
decisions, clinical trials serve as the first step towards providing new
clinical innovations to the forefront of medical practice. [White House,
Executive Memorandum, 6/7/00]
Released Strong New Protections for the Privacy of Electronic Medical
Records. The Clinton-Gore Administration released a new regulation to
protect the privacy of electronic medical records held by health plans, health
care clearinghouses, and health care providers. This rule would limit the use
and release of private health information without consent; restrict the
disclosure of protected health information to the minimum amount of information
necessary; establish new requirements for disclosure of information to
researchers and others seeking access to health records; and establish new
administrative and criminal sanctions for the improper use or disclosure of
private information. [Domestic Policy Council]
Implementing Comprehensive Nursing Home Quality Initiative. The
Clinton-Gore Administration has issued the toughest nursing home regulations in
the history of the Medicare and Medicaid programs, including increased
monitoring of nursing homes to ensure that they are in compliance; requiring
states to crack down on nursing homes that repeatedly violate health and safety
requirements; and changing the inspection process to increase the focus on
preventing bedsores, malnutrition and resident abuse. Won $43.5 million
increase in FY 2000 to fund more rigorous inspections of nursing facilities and
improved federal oversight and enforcement of nursing home quality. [HHS Fact
Sheet, 12/14/99; National Economic Council, 11/18/99]
Ensuring Safe Food for America's Families. President Clinton
created the President's Council on Food Safety to develop a comprehensive
food safety strategic plan for federal agencies. The Clinton-Gore
Administration has implemented a new science-based inspection system -- Hazard
Analysis and Critical Control Points -- and reduced the prevalence of
salmonella in raw meat and poultry by as much as 50 percent. The
Administration formed national computer network of public health laboratories,
called PulseNet, to help rapidly identify and stop outbreaks of foodborne
illness by performing DNA "fingerprinting" on foodborne pathogens. The
President signed the Food Quality Protection Act, which included special
safeguards for kids and strengthened laws governing pesticides and food safety.
The Administration also issued new rules to prevent foodborne illness caused by
pathogens such as E. coli. [Executive Order 13100, 8/25/98; USDA
Press Release, 10/7/99; Presidential Statement, 8/3/96; USDA Press Release,
10/7/99]
Raised Child Immunization Rates to All Time High. Childhood
immunization coverage rates in 1998 were the highest ever recorded. 90 percent
of toddlers in 1996, 1997 and 1998 received the most critical doses of each of
the routinely recommended vaccines, surpassing the President's 1993 goal.
Because childhood vaccination levels in the United States are at an all-time
high, disease and death from diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, measles, mumps,
rubella and Hib are at or near record lows. There was only one reported case of
diphtheria, 100 reported cases of measles, and no reported cases of wild
poliovirus for 1998. [HHS Fact Sheet, 9/23/99; HHS Fact Sheet, 12/31/99]
Issued Regulation that Drug Companies Provide Adequate Testing for
Children. President Clinton directed an important Food and Drug
Administration regulation requiring manufacturers to do studies on pediatric
populations for new prescription drugs -- and those currently on the market --
to ensure that prescription drugs have been adequately tested for the unique
needs of children. [Domestic Policy Council]
New Efforts to Help Consumers Understand Important Information on
Over the Counter Drug Labels. The President unveiled a historic new FDA
regulation that, for the first time, requires over-the-counter drug products to
use a new product label with larger print and clearer language, making it
easier for consumers to understand product warnings and comply with dosage
guidance. The new regulation provides Americans with essential information
about their medications in a user friendly way and takes a critical first step
towards preventing the tens of thousands of unnecessary hospitalizations caused
by misuse of over-the-counter medications each year. [Domestic Policy
Council]
Promoting Reproductive Health. The Clinton-Gore Administration
has taken strong steps to protect a woman's right to choose and to promote
safe reproductive health services for women. The President has provided
contraceptive coverage to more than a million women covered by federal health
plans; provided family planning services to low income women through the
Medicaid program; stood up against attempts to prohibit the FDA from approving
RU-486; and continues to fight restrictions on international family planning.
[Domestic Policy Council, Health Care Achievements] | 
