Sen. Elizabeth Warren and 6 different Democratic lawmakers are urgent for solutions from Mehmet Oz, President-elect Donald Trump’s decide to supervise the Facilities for Medicare and Medicaid Companies. Their considerations need to do together with his proposal to denationalise Medicare and conflicts of curiosity if confirmed to steer the well being group overseeing the well being care of greater than 12 million People.
A letter, signed by Democrats and despatched on Tuesday, highlights “stark concerns” about Oz’s monetary ties of shares of “at least $550,000 invested in UnitedHealth Group, the largest private insurer in Medicare Advantage.” This might imply “under Dr. Oz’s plan, UnitedHealth Group’s revenue from Medicare Advantage would roughly double to $274 billion annually.”
Along with Warren, it was cosigned by Sen. Ron Wyden, Rep. Lloyd Doggett, Sen. Jeff Merkley, Sen. Dick Durbin, Sen. Richard Blumenthal, and Sen. Ben Cardin.
The Democratic lawmakers referred to a 2020 Forbes op-ed cowritten by Oz that known as for switching People into the privatized Medicare Benefit, changing the normal Medicare program that insures aged, low-income, and disabled People.
“Dr. Oz outlined his vision for the Medicare program, in which he advocated to eliminate Traditional Medicare and instead lean on private insurers that run Medicare Advantage, a private health care program that drastically overcharges for care.”
Oz, a star physician and TV host, was nominated by Trump on Nov. 19. He had beforehand been criticized for conflicts of curiosity when he pushed the debunked COVID-19 remedy hydroxychloroquine early on within the pandemic—a medicine wherein he owns inventory.
Oz ran a failed Pennsylvania Senate marketing campaign in 2022, throughout which greater than 100 docs slammed the Republican candidate for “lying to the American people about medicine.” He was additionally infamously mocked for not realizing his means round a neighborhood grocery retailer.
In 2014, British Medical Journal analysis discovered pseudoscience was being promoted on his discuss present, “The Dr. Oz Show.” All of the whereas, Oz was making steep earnings from the “health” merchandise, ads, and weight-loss dietary supplements he promoted on the nationwide present.
Oz matches in properly with Trump’s crappy Cupboard cohort. Trump has a knack for nominating unqualified billionaires, D-list actuality TV contestants, snake-oil quacks, and anti-science conmen set on making irresponsible well being care selections. Nonetheless, Democrats appear like they’re a minimum of placing up a battle by stating they don’t help this Cupboard of clowns. Their techniques, in line with CNN, are a special strategy from Trump’s first time period.
“The mood is slightly different than the last time and there is a sense that if you are freaking out about everything, it becomes really hard for people to sort out what is worth worrying about,” Sen. Brian Schatz, a Democrat from Hawaii, informed CNN.
Now, Democrats wish to implement a deliberate and disciplined technique in Trump’s second time period: stating the locations the place they might work with a nominee once they see match and forcing Republicans to defend Trump’s picks when a nominee faces ethics questions, has a historical past of controversial statements or doesn’t have what Democrats view as the mandatory {qualifications} for the job.
Dropping their majority within the Senate, it’s unlikely Democrats will be capable to preserve Oz away from the place. Nonetheless, Democratic lawmakers have concluded they want extra particular solutions from Oz, requesting him to submit solutions by Dec. 24 to a collection of questions on his views on Medicare and U.S. well being care and the way he would run the division.
“Given your financial ties to private insurers, combined with your view that the traditional Medicare program is ‘highly dysfunctional’ and your advocacy for eliminating it entirely, it is not clear that you are qualified for this critical job,” lawmakers wrote.
