Nancy Johnson

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Every woman gets a free physical under this bill, and for the first time they have an option for a plan that provides entirely free preventative benefits across the board to men and women. So this is an enormous advancement for women because women are the ones who get the poorest health care throughout their lives, and they will have an option to a plan that has free preventive benefits across the board and, if they choose it, and they will all get a free baseline physical when they enter Medicare. Yes, a great advancement for senior women.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 465, I call up the bill (H.R. 4954) to amend title XVIII of the Social Security Act to provide for a voluntary program for prescription drug coverage under the Medicare Program, to modernize and reform payments and the regulatory structure of the Medicare Program, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Thomas), the chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means and an expert on health policy and prescription drugs.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Ryan), but in the course of doing that I want to mention that the Congressional Budget Office in their letter to us made clear that exempting Medicare prescription drug plans from Medicaid's best price drives down drug prices $18 billion for our seniors.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 4954 because it provides prescription drugs to all seniors as an entitlement under Medicare. Mr. Speaker, I am honored to bring this bill to the floor of this great House. Everywhere I go, seniors look at me with worry in their eyes, concern that they will not be able to buy the prescription drugs needed to get well, worry that they will not be able to afford the many prescriptions needed to enable them to enjoy their lives and keep on with their daily activities. Mr. Speaker, nothing is more important than assuring that our seniors have access to prescription drugs as part of Medicare, within Medicare as part of that entitlement to health services, because indeed, Medicare without prescription drugs is a mere shadow of the promise of health care security that Medicare has always represented to the seniors of our great country. Mr. Speaker, I am very proud that this bill provides the deepest discounts on drug prices that any bill has ever brought to this floor. It is a 30 percent discount, compared to every other plan that provides a 10 percent discount. On top of that 30 percent discount are powerful subsidies, 80 percent subsidies, up to $1,000 in drug costs, and \50/50\ after that. This is powerful help. For those living under 150 percent of poverty income, it will provide 100 percent of their drug cost needs up to $2,000. For over that, States will have freed-up resources to help those that cannot afford their prescriptions. This is a powerful benefit for our seniors right up through catastrophic coverage, which provides the peace of mind that they so deserve in their senior years. But that is not all this bill does. It goes on to provide better preventive care for our seniors and to provide those plans that are able to provide disease management, which is the only way that seniors with chronic illness are going to enjoy health in their elder years. Also, it reduces the cost of medication errors, provides safety for our seniors, compensates our providers more realistically, and in general, would strengthen our Medicare program. I am going to go into the details of the bill later, Mr. Speaker. I will reserve my time for a discussion of this powerful new expansion of Medicare to improve the lives of the seniors of our country. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes and 15 seconds to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Crane).

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. McCrery), an esteemed member of the Subcommittee on Health of the Committee on Ways and Means. (Mr. McCRERY asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I assume my colleague was speaking on his own time.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle). (Mr. NUSSLE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Washington (Ms. Dunn), a member of the Committee on Ways and Means.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 20 seconds. I want to make a correction of the record. Over and over again my colleagues say we do not have a defined benefit. We have a very clearly defined benefit. Do we have a defined premium? Of course not. The part B premium is not defined. That is a percentage of costs and it varies every year. Federal health employee benefit plans do not define the premium in law. It varies every year. In our plan we do not want to set the premium in law because if we can provide a more efficient plan, we want to be able to pass on that savings through a lower premium to seniors. We are proud of our core benefit. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman).

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from California (Mr. Thomas).

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 10 seconds. Under Medicare we have part A. We have part B. We have part C, and this will be part D under Medicare, providing prescription drugs to seniors to any plan sponsor, and plan sponsors may be a group of any sort, preferably companies skilled and experienced in managing drug benefits. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Camp). (Mr. CAMP asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to note that it is curious the gentleman from California keeps citing the votes that we cast against his unfunded amendments, the unfunded amendments from the other side, when he is about to cast a vote against funding 43 percent of the seniors in California with everything, drug costs, copayments, deductibles, premiums, the whole business, 43 percent, and saving California $5 billion under Medicaid with which they can then expand drug benefits for many other folks in their State. Too bad. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. English).

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 15 seconds. I would like to point out to the gentleman from South Dakota that, while on page 18 of the other party's bill they say they require any willing provider, on page 8 of the other party's bill they say that there has to be pharmacy networks and the networks can determine cost sharing for beneficiaries outside the network. So their bill does not provide any willing providers; and ours, at a later time, provides a lot of recognition to pharmacists. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Hayworth).

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Weller). (Mr. WELLER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Brady).

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter).

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 5 seconds. Respectfully, how could a sham bill accelerate the pace at which technology will come into Medicare for the first time ever? And I am proud of it. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Grucci).

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Blunt).

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, as a result of our arcane and complicated pension laws, 70 million workers have no pension plan. Unfortunately, Americans who work in small businesses are much less likely to have pension coverage than those who work for larger companies. Among companies with fewer than 100 employees, as many as 80% of the workforce have no retirement savings plan available to them. The primary cause: small business owners find the cost and complexity of setting up and maintaining retirement plans to be overwhelming. So last year, Congress passed the Portman-Cardin pension reforms to help workers save for their future and enable small businesses to offer pension plans to their employees. The changes we made streamline and simplify the complex rules governing our pension system to ensure meaningful coverage of small business employees. They will reduce the administrative burden on small businesses and provide incentives to help them establish plans for their workers, including cutting the IRS user fee small businesses have to pay to establish a pension plan and lowering premiums small businesses pay for their defined benefit plans to make that option more attractive. Several years ago we adopted ``SIMPLE'' pension plans. That has enabled numerous small companies in my district to offer plans to their employees. This modernization of our basic pension law will expand and improve retirement options dramatically, which in the long run, means more working Americans will enjoy financial security in their retirement years. I urge passage of this legislation.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to acknowledge the achievements of three excellent teachers from West District School in Farmington, Connecticut. They are Mrs. Louise Belkin, Mr. Frank Joslyn, and Mrs. Terry Werden. All three will leave West District at the end of the 2001-2002 school year. Mrs. Belkin has been an elementary school teacher in the Farmington School System for 33 years, teaching at West District for 27 years. She has been a leader in the field of mathematics and served as the school's math resource teacher for 14 years. During this time, she created and composed math curriculum and assessments for the district as well as organized and taught the district's math summer school program. She has served as an elementary-level representative to the ATOMIC Executive Board and a PIMMS Fellow. In 2001, she co-authored a geometry book to be used by teachers published by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. Mrs. Belkin has actively served in the Farmington Education Association, serving as the building representative for ten years, treasurer for fourteen years and a member of the negotiations committee through five contracts. Over the past 20 years, Mrs. Belkin has arranged for me to hold annual press conferences for West District School's fifth grade. I have looked forward to this every year and regret that Mrs. Belkin's retirement and the change in the grade structure in the Farmington School system mean the end of these events at West District School. Mr. Frank Joslyn was recognized as Farmington's Teacher of the Year for 1993-94. He served with the Farmington Education Association as a building representative, a Council member and an officer. He developed and implemented a ``Homes of America'' program for both parents and children, teaching them history through architecture. He also co- planned and produced the annual Veteran's Day Program at West District School. And he served as West District's ``lead teacher'' for more than 8 weeks during the prolonged illness of the principal. Mr. Joslyn's influence on the school body and fellow members of the faculty has been tremendous. He has shared his artistic skills to enhance the school building, designing a display case, memorial benches, banners as well as the school's letterhead and note cards and a memorial sculpture. While everyone at West District School will miss Mr. Joslyn's leadership and artistic insight, we take comfort in the knowledge that the students at Farmington's new 5-6 school will benefit from his talents and abilities. Mrs. Terry Werden has been with West District School for 34 years, serving as the Science Resource Teacher for 13 years. She served as an outdoor educator, organized the ``Kids and Chemistry'' nights for several years and introduced the ``Invention Convention'' the West District School's Grade 5. She also has given her time as an active member of the Farmington Education Association, and as a member of curriculum teams for writing, science and social studies. She currently has three students whose parents she also taught in the Farmington School system. Mrs. Werden is a dedicated public servant and her influence has been strongly felt throughout West District School and the families it serves. Her presence within our walls will be greatly missed, as she moves on to teach at Farmington's new 5-6 school. These three educators have served on the same team for a quarter of a century. Combined, their efforts have amounted to 93 years of service at the West District School. The children, parents and families whose lives have been touched by their expertise and dedication can never forget the example of public service these three outstanding educators have set. I wish them well in all their future endeavors.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman for yielding me time and rise in strong support of this legislation. Mr. Chairman, I want to remind the body that this bill will provide $10 million for the Customs Cyber-Smuggling Center. This center, along with FBI, does all that work that is so critical to protecting our children from people who lurk on the Internet in cyberspace with the explicit and sole goal of exploiting them for sexual purposes. The Internet has become not only an opportunity for all of us and for America, but it has also become a new venue for crime. While most Members are not aware of it, most of the child pornography that flows into America from abroad now flows in through cyberspace. So the Customs officials are extremely involved in preventing cyber-smuggling of pornographic material and stopping the cyberspace attacks on our children. The Customs officials are very skilled now at going into the chat rooms on our computers, following the conversations that go on there and spotting those individuals who are posing as young people but are actually adults out to lure children into meetings where they can be sexually exploited, or, in the tragic case of a young girl in Connecticut, murdered. That happened just this week. So the computers, their chat rooms, cyberspace, represents a new and terrible danger for our children. These same people used to lurk around school yards. That did have at least the advantage of our being able to see them and adults being able to report them and the police being able to pick them up. Now they do not have to lurk around school yards. They do not have to be seen visibly. They can lurk in the chat rooms that our children frequent and they can play on their innocence and their trust to build up communication with them and to give them the confidence to meet them. Then, when they have the meeting, when they get the child in their literal physical grasp, that child then is helpless. So the Customs Cyber-Smuggling Center has been on the front line of stemming this attack on our children, and this bill gives them $10 million that is critical to their beefing up their staff, to their being more effective in intercepting conversations with children and preventing those critical meetings and thereby protecting our children. So I commend the chairman on this legislation, and particularly for being able to work with us and include this critical money in this bill. But I also want to address the importance of voting for the bill and voting against the substitute. The protection that is given to the Customs officials in this bill is protection that was requested by the Customs Department, that is wanted by the Customs officers, that was supported by the Treasury last time around on this bill and responds very deeply to their need to be protected just for doing their job. There are tragic stories of Customs officials carrying out their responsibilities, doing what they are required by law to do to protect us, and then being sued, left out there by the government to pay all their own costs of the litigation, losing their homes. There are terrible stories, and only because they are doing their job. But we encourage litigation in our society. We encourage settlement of suits where there has been no wrongdoing, and we leave our Customs officials exposed. They explicitly asked for this protection. We can do no less than provide it for them.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this important legislation. I thank the chairman for bringing it forward. Passage of this bill is not an effort to just be helpful to the FBI. It is a necessary tool that the FBI must have if they are to track down these predators and to reduce the threat to our children. The threat to our children is real. The need to address it is urgent. In talking with Ernie Allen, president and CEO of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, he tells a compelling story. In visiting a classroom, he and a reporter asked the children, How many of you have been approached sexually on the Internet? Every single hand went up. And then the kids were asked, And how many of you told your parents? Not a single hand went up. The children are terrified. They are afraid to tell their parents because this threat is so both nebulous and mysterious. They are frightened by it but think they are protected by the computer and don't need to tell their parents. In fact these criminals are very clever, weedle information from children, earn their trust, and then they are vulnerable kids also are afraid that their parents will deny them access to the computer if they acquaint their parents with the dangers that lurk there. Our children need our protection. These conversations on the Internet that lure and entice them lead them to telephone conversations that set up meetings. Just yesterday, a 13-year-old girl in my home State, a beautiful young woman, an honor student, a cheerleader, was found murdered. She met her murderer online. He lured her from her home, sexually abused her and killed her. This is real. It is present, and all of our children are experiencing it. In 1999, and this is old data now, one in five children reported having been sexually solicited on the Internet. That is 5 million children. Today we believe this is the most under-reported crime in the Nation. It is just simply a terrible situation, it is urgent, and if our FBI agents are not able to track the conversation they spot beginning on the Internet when it transfers to the telephone, which it always does before meeting, then they are weakened in their ability to prevent the sexual molestation and possible murder of our children. They just want the same tools that the predators have. That is all. They want to be able to interrupt those conversations before the meeting takes place or be there when the meeting takes place, and they want the evidence off the tape recording of the wiretap to use in court because it is tangible, and it will protect many of our children from having to testify. Mr. Speaker, this is a long-overdue bill. I appreciate the concern of those who are worried about extending wiretap authority; but this is a concrete, demonstrated need that the courts have to approve. I urge support of this legislation.

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut

Mrs. JOHNSON of Connecticut. I thank the gentleman from Arizona very much. As members of the Committee on Ways and Means, we work together on many, many issues, but no issue more important than prescription drugs for seniors. I am proud to say that our bill is an entitlement. It is going to be available to all seniors. It is going to be in my estimation, I think this is something that is rarely remembered, that the prescription drug benefit is going to be the greatest leap forward in women's health since the founding of Medicare. We all know that our grandmothers have lived longer than our grandfathers, that in general women tend to live quite a lot longer than men. What we are less aware of is that older women tend to have a lot less income than older men. The mean annual income of men over 65 is about $30,000 nationwide. The mean annual income of women over 65 is about $15,000 nationwide, exactly half. So women live longer but have much less disposable income. In fact, in the under-85 and the over-85 senior population, women are almost twice as likely as men to have incomes below $10,000 a year. What this tells you is that our retired women in America are very unlikely to be able to afford expensive prescription drugs, and they are very unlikely to be able to afford MediGap policies and those other supplementary insurance plans that are available but cost money and that fill that gap between what Medicare covers and what seniors have to pay. It is particularly a problem in prescription drugs, because in today's medicine, you cannot recover from most diseases without taking a prescription drug. So for us to pay for our seniors to be able to go to the doctor and get a diagnosis, which is increasingly expensive with the sophisticated tests and diagnostic technologies that are now available, wonderful medicine, wonderful world, but what is the good of being diagnosed if you cannot get the treatment? But it is not just about medicines to cure illness that makes prescription drugs in Medicare so important, it is the need to have prescription drugs to manage chronic illness. And there the statistics are incredible. Of the seniors over 85, 72 percent are women and most have multiple chronic illnesses. So they need drugs more than any other single group of our population and that is women with multiple chronic illnesses. So it is important to remember that, frankly, prescription drugs in Medicare is the number one women's issue in America today. I am determined to work with the gentleman from Arizona and to work with the rest of those on our committee to bring prescription drugs in Medicare to the floor of this House. I thank you for going through the principles that must underlie this bill. We are going to have a bill that is a more generous benefit than we were able to bring to the floor 2 years ago, that is more thoroughly thought out than any bill that has been introduced in this body or the other to this point, and that will be practical, workable, and because it involves a discount card that will be out there right away, it will help seniors from day one till the time the program is thoroughly established in 2 years and that is a unique aspect of our bill. I would be happy to go into any aspect of this really important subject that you have not already explored. I am sorry I had to be late, but it is a pleasure to be with you tonight to talk about really the most important legislative initiative that this body will consider this session of Congress. If we do it by the end of June, I hope the other body will have the courage to move in July so that we can have a bill on the President's desk in the fall.