U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., Judiciary Committee chairman, announced in a recent speech that patent reform, online piracy and counterfeiting, and the repeal of the antitrust exemption for health insurers would be his top priorities this coming year.
With regard to McCarran-Ferguson Act repeal, Leahy said he will continue to seek to repeal the health insurance industry’s antitrust exemption.
“I also hope Congress will finally repeal the health insurance industry’s exemption from our antitrust laws,” he added. “There was bipartisan support for this repeal in the last Congress. There is no place in our health insurance market for anticompetitive abuses, and repealing this exemption is an important step toward bringing competition to the health insurance market.”
In January 2010, Leahy sent a letter in collaboration with 18 other senators to President Obama; Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., Senate majority leader; and Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., House Speaker, asking for the final Health Care Reform Compromise to include language to repeal the McCarran-Ferguson Act antitrust exemption for health insurers and medical malpractice insurers. In December 2009, the House of Representatives passed health care reform legislation that included a repeal of the antitrust exemption for health insurers, but the Senate-approved legislation excluded such language. The letter stated:
“There is simply no reason for health insurance and medical malpractice insurance companies to be exempt from federal laws prohibiting price fixing, bid rigging and market allocation. These acts hurt consumers, drive up health care costs, and should be prohibited in the health insurance industry, as they are in virtually every other industry.”
In February 2010, the U.S. House of Representatives considered a partial repeal of the McCarran-Ferguson Act that would have applied to health insurers only, known as H.R. 3596. The purpose of H.R. 3596 was to ensure that health insurance issuers and medical malpractice insurance issuers could not engage in price fixing, bid rigging or market allocations to the detriment of competition and consumers.
Later that month, the House passed H.R. 4626, the Health Insurance Industry Fair Competition Act, which amended the McCarran-Ferguson Act to provide that 1) nothing in the act shall modify, impair or supersede the operation of any of the antitrust laws with respect to the business of health insurance; and 2) Federal Trade Commission Act prohibitions against using unfair methods of competition shall apply to the business of health insurance without regard to whether such business is carried on for profit.
In early 2007, Leahy introduced legislation that would repeal the McCarran-Ferguson Act, the Insurance Industry Competition Act (Senate Bill 618). This legislation was proposed to remove the federal antitrust exemption for all insurers. The Automotive Service Association (ASA) has worked closely with Leahy and the committee in efforts to repeal McCarran-Ferguson.
More information:
To view the text of any of these bills and the repeal of specific McCarran-Ferguson Act provisions, visit ASA’s legislative website at www.TakingTheHill.com.
