Senate Finance Committee holds hearing for HHS secretary nominee

The Senate Finance Committee today held a confirmation hearing for Rep. Tom Price (R-GA), President Trump’s nominee for secretary of Health and Human Services. Price said his first order of business if confirmed as HHS secretary would be to see how the president’s recent executive order would be implemented by the department. Asked by Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) if he would use the executive order to try to eliminate the individual mandate, Price said he believed that a reform or replacement plan should be “instituted simultaneously” with a repeal. Price also told the committee that “nobody ought to be priced out of the market for having a preexisting condition” and expressed support for extending the Children’s Health Insurance Program. Urged by Sen. John Thune (R-SD) to permanently extend the enforcement moratorium on direct supervision requirements for outpatient therapeutic services provided in critical access hospitals and rural prospective payment system hospitals with 100 or fewer beds, Price said, “I look forward to working with you on it.” He also expressed support for telemedicine and other technologies, especially in rural areas.