Repealing Physician Compliance of Health and Human Services Mandates, as Established by the Affordable Care Act (S. 2278)

What is S. 2278?

(Updated November 14, 2014)

 This bill, commonly referred to as The SCOPE Act, deals with 23 words in the 2,700-page Affordable Care Act. The bill would repeal the ability of the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), under the Affordable Care Act, to prohibit health insurers from working with doctors and other medical providers who fail to meet quality services standards designated by the Secretary. The Secretary’s ability to make such prohibitions is scheduled to take effect January 1st, 2015. 

Argument in favor

Safeguards doctor-patient relationships and quality of care. Allows doctors to make case-by-case decisions. State-level medical entities should be able to function without interference from federal agencies.

Argument opposed

The Health and Human Services mandate is in place to assure bottom-line care and would not impact the doctor-patient relationship. Without federal oversight, state healthcare systems lack legitimate accountability.

Impact

The bill implicitly asks whether or not the federal government should be able to enforce nationwide healthcare mandates. If the bill is passed, nothing changes: doctors remain accountable to state-level entities such as insurers and state licensing boards, and follow state regulations. If the ACA provision does go into effect as it is scheduled to on January 1st, 2015, doctors and hospitals will have to comply. This could, and most likely would, mean policy changes for both private practices and hospitals.

Cost of S. 2278

A CBO cost estimate is not available.

Additional Info

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