White House

This afternoon, President Obama released his proposed budget for fiscal year 2014. Among several cost-cutting measures designed to preserve Medicare solvency is a proposal to reduce reimbursement for life-sustaining cancer drugs. Currently, reimbursement to physicians for “Part B” drugs is based on the average sales price plus a 6 percent payment for services needed to administer chemotherapy in physicians’ offices, where most cancer patients receive their care. The President has proposed to reduce the 6 percent service payment to 3 percent. (The budget proposal appears to apply cuts primarily to physicians, but also mentions rebates that will be required by manufacturers.)

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The House today passed a stopgap federal spending bill, now on its way to the White House for signing, to prevent a government shutdown next week. The measure includes an additional $71 million for the National Institutes of Health as well as an additional $10 million for the National Cancer Institute. It also includes an additional $74 million for the Food and Drug Administration.

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Today, March 1, marks the beginning of sequestration, the unprecedented automatic budget cuts that immediately take effect across the federal government-after months of futile negotiations by the President and Congress.

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In his State of the Union Address Feb. 12, President Barack Obama called on Congress to avoid the harmful effects of the automatic budget cuts set to take place March 1. The sequester could result in a 5.1 percent cut to the budget of the National Institutes of Health.

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ASCO and the American College of Cardiology (ACC) sent a letter to President Barack Obama, urging him to prevent a triple-threat of devastating budget cuts threatened by sequestration.

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Congress passed and President Obama approved last month the Recalcitrant Cancer Research Act of 2012, which requires the National Cancer Institute to identify cancers with low survival rates and convene working groups to develop scientific strategies to improve research on those cancers.

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The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has issued an update on processing claims through the 2013 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule if Congress ...

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ASCO warns that the automatic budget cuts detailed in the sequestration report released today by the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB)...

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