Even With Split Congress, Some Experts Predict Heightened Health Care Oversight

Although there’s a divided Congress this year — with Republicans controlling the House and Democrats in charge of the Senate — there are still a variety of health care policy issues that federal and state legislators alike have in their crosshairs, experts said during a recent webinar hosted by the Alliance for Health Policy. And some of those agenda items could be of considerable interest to health insurance companies. 

Paul Edattel, principal of Todd Strategy Group, LLC, a federal government affairs firm, said he expects the newly Republican-controlled House to zero in on budgetary issues. “Budgetary issues are top-of-mind for House Republicans and some Senate Republicans,” he remarked during the Jan. 25 webinar. “Things like the operating budget for the Department of Health and Human Services...will be under really heightened scrutiny relative to prior Congresses.”