WASHINGTON, D.C. - This week, San Diego Federal Judge Thomas Whelan ordered the injunction of a Medicare bidding program that threatened the well-being of both patients and laboratories. The Court's decision follows last year's hearings on the issue by the House Committee on Small Business. The Congressional panel found the program's guidelines unreasonable and likely to cause irreparable harm to both patients and healthcare providers.

"The court made a wise decision. CMS' ill-conceived program would have compromised access to services for many Medicare recipients and put many great laboratories out of business," said Committee Chairwoman Nydia M. Velazquez.

There are nearly 5,000 small clinical providers in the country providing high quality services to a wide variety of patients. Many are in vulnerable and underserved communities in rural areas or in nursing homes. The proposal by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services would have instituted a bidding process restricting the number of labs that provide such care. The result would have been larger firms-which already control 70% of the market-shutting out smaller competitors.

"When it comes to medical services, quality is what matters-not size," said Chairwoman Velazquez. "CMS' pilot bidding program allows the government to pick and choose the winners and losers arbitrarily. That's unfair to small firms and bad for patients."

The ruling by Judge Whelan is subject to appeal by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which means the program may still go forward. That makes the adoption of Chairwoman Velazquez' Community Clinical Laboratory Fairness in Competition Act legislation (H.R. 3453), all the more pressing. Her bill, introduced last August, calls for a full repeal of the CMS program. It has 40 bipartisan co-sponsors in the House, and similar legislation has subsequently been introduced in the Senate.

"CMS has shown itself unwilling to listen to the concerns of small laboratories. My bill ensures the needs of these entrepreneurs-and the patients whom they serve-are not ignored," said Chairwoman Velazquez. "I remain committed to addressing this problem and won't allow a poorly designed process to harm Americans."

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