Congress remains in session on Capitol Hill this coming week. Here is a link to the Week in Congress’s report on last week’s actions there.

Last week, OPM General Counsel Mark Robbins’ second job at the Merit System Protection Board ended when his term on that Board expired per the Federal News Network.  While OPM now has a full time general counsel, the MSPB now has no Board members, which of course is not Mr. Robbin’s fault.  The Senate needs to fill the empty slots. The MSBP hears federal employee disciplinary appeals and related federal employment issues. The appeals are first heard by administrative law judges. The administrative law judges are still working but there’s no one to hear appeals from the administrative law judge decisions.

The Wall Street Journal reminds us that

Bigger bills [for budget busting gene therapy drugs] aren’t very far off. Analysts expect a Novartis gene-therapy treatment for spinal muscular atrophy, which hasn’t yet reached the market, to generate $1.7 billion in sales by 2023. Novartis said at its investor day last year it believes the drug is cost-effective at a price tag of $4 million to $5 million per patient. Other drugs in development by smaller companies are expected to achieve similar sales over that time frame. Given the long lead times in drug development, tens of billions of dollars in market value is predicated on insurers covering gene therapies under development in much the same way that today’s medicines are. The perfect opportunity to rethink how medicine is paid for is here. But, should that be squandered, patients, insurers, investors, drug makers and the government could end up in a bitter battle over who will pay for these medical breakthroughs. 

How true.

Kaiser Health News reports that

Eight hundred hospitals will be paid less by Medicare this year because of high rates of infections and patient injuries, federal records show. The number is the highest since the federal government five years ago launched the Hospital Acquired Conditions (HAC) Reduction Program, created by the Affordable Care Act. Under the program, 1,756 hospitals have been penalized at least once, a Kaiser Health News analysis found. This year, 110 hospitals are being punished for the fifth straight time.

Here’s a link to Kaiser’s list of penalized hospitals.

P.S. This was the 2500th FEHBlog post.