On July 18, the House Education and Labor Committee approved, 33-9, the Paul Wellstone Mental Health and Addiction Equity Act of 2007 (H.R. 1424), after adopting a substitute amendment by Chair George Miller (D-CA). The House Education and Labor Subcommittee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions held a hearing on the bill on July 10 (see The Source, 7/16/07).
The bill would prohibit annual or lifetime dollar limits on mental health benefits that are more restrictive than annual or lifetime dollar limits for medical and surgical benefits offered under the same plan. The measure also would direct the comptroller general to study the effects of mental health parity, including projected costs for health insurance coverage, Medicare, Medicaid, and state and local mental health and substance abuse treatment providers.
Rep. Miller said, “Today, 44 million Americans suffer from mental illnesses, which are sometimes life-threatening. Only one-third of Americans with mental illnesses receive treatment for them. Although 46 states have laws governing treatment for mental illnesses, many people are still left without sufficient mental health coverage…A key part of the problem is that private health insurers generally provide less coverage for mental illnesses than for other medical conditions. Health plans tend to impose lower annual or lifetime dollar limits on mental health coverage, limit treatment of mental health illnesses by covering fewer hospital days and outpatient office visits, and raise deductibles and co-payments beyond a point that is reasonable.” He continued, “The bill before us today would close the gap in coverage for people without adequate mental health coverage…I strongly support this legislation, and I urge my colleagues to vote for it today.”
“To begin, H.R. 1424 overreaches by burdening employers with excessive, new mandates that have the potential to increase costs to them and as a result, decrease coverage for their workers,” said Ranking Member Howard P. “Buck” McKeon (R-CA). Rep. McKeon continued, “For example, by requiring virtually every mental illness defined by the mental health profession including caffeine addiction, jetlag, and others to be covered by plans, this mandate would take us in exactly the wrong direction from our shared goal of increasing health coverage and reducing the ranks of the uninsured…Mr. Chairman, I hope that after this bill moves forward and it becomes clearer how unworkable it truly is, we will have the opportunity to work together toward legislation that provides greater parity between the coverage of mental and physical illnesses. But this bill will not get us there.”
During consideration of the measure, the committee defeated a substitute amendment by Rep. John Kline (R-MN), 16-27. The amendment would have substituted the language of the Mental Health Parity Act of 2007 (S. 558). The Senate bill would require group health plans to cover mental health services at the same rate as physical and medical services. However, unlike the House bill, S. 558 would supersede existing state laws that have more stringent mental health provisions. S. 558 was approved by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee on February 14 (see The Source, 2/16/07).
