Rep. Darrell Issa

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, on Oct. 22 issued a subpoena to HHS to turn over additional documents related to a department demonstration program that rewards Medicare Advantage (MA) plans based on star quality ratings, POLITICO reported. Issa has argued that the program, known as the Medicare Advantage Quality Bonus Payment Demonstration, is just a ruse to hide MA plan payment cuts that are part of the health reform law and a is political ploy.

Although HHS delivered more than 1,300 pages of documents on Oct. 18 to the congressman, Issa contends that the information was not responsive to his request, the newspaper said. In March, a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report recommended that HHS Sec. Kathleen Sebelius cancel the demonstration, which is estimated to cost $8.3 billion over 10 years.

“We are concerned that the only plausible explanation for the Demonstration is that you decided to utilize a loophole…to temporarily cover up ObamaCare’s large cuts to the 13 million seniors enrolled in Medicare Advantage until after this year’s election,”

Issa and Rep. James Lankford (R-Okla.) wrote in an Oct. 17 letter to Sebelius. The committee’s majority staff says that the price tag for the project is more than the 85 previous Medicare demonstration projects combined.

(Reprinted from AIS’s Health Reform Week's e-News Alert)