Ezra Klein has an interview with Senator Tom Coburn that focuses on health care reform. Lots could be said about the interview, but I want to focus on what I see as the hypocrisy displayed by Sen. Coburn in his criticism of the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) that will be created if the Affordable Care Act is implemented. In the interview with Klein, Sen. Coburn says:
The reason I object to IPAB is you’ve got someone between the patient and the physician, and that can never be in the best interest of the patient.
The most shocking thing to me about Sen. Coburn’s consistent demonization of IPAB as a “rationing board” is the fact that a bill (Patients’ Choice Act) that he co-sponsored and introduced on May 20, 2009 contained two unelected boards (IPAB is also quite weak; another post). That means that key Republicans supported unelected health boards a full month before the first House committee reported out HR3200. I have written tons on this issue specifically, and about Sen. Coburn’s Patients’ Choice Act generally (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here), including some favorable things. I guess I am just naive, but this level of hypocrisy still shocks me.
Below is a post I wrote in May 2011 that focused on Rep. Paul Ryan, another co-sponsor of the PCA; just insert Sen. Coburn’s name as you read; they have behaved similarly on this issue.
Continue reading “Sen. Coburn: for unelected health boards before he was against them”