O'Neill: Part D 'worst social legislation' in his lifetime

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

The federal government's new Medicare prescription drug program is another example of how the country is missing chances for real savings and improvement in health care, former U.S. Treasury secretary and Alcoa chairman Paul O'Neill said yesterday.

"It's the worst piece of social legislation in my lifetime," Mr. O'Neill said of the new Part D program during a talk at the Duquesne Club, Downtown. "This thing is just a nightmare."

Mr. O'Neill only touched briefly on Medicare during his speech at Duquesne University's 16th Annual Donahue Business Society Spring Luncheon. But he spoke more broadly about how the nation's health system could be reformed in ways that would improve care while slashing its price.

Practicing the best medicine possible -- including the elimination of hospital-acquired infections and medication errors -- would could cut health-care spending in half while helping patients, Mr. O'Neill said, repeating a message he's delivered for several years.

The savings could help guarantee access to health care for uninsured Americans, he added. The money saved also could help bring clean water to sub-Saharan Africa -- another cause that Mr. O'Neill has championed since leaving the Bush administration in late 2002.

Hospital-acquired infections were one of the issues that Mr. O'Neill challenged hospitals to address through the Pittsburgh Regional Healthcare Initiative, a nonprofit group that has led a variety of quality improvement efforts since the late 1990s. Mr. O'Neill resigned as its chief executive officer in late 2004 and no longer serves on the initiative's board of directors.

"I got push-back from the major players in town who said, 'We don't want you setting our priorities,' " he said.

In 2005, Mr. O'Neill created a for-profit company that consults with hospitals on quality issues.