health insurers

Description

U.S. Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said she talked with health-care companies she regulates, including Johnson & Johnson, about helping a nonprofit group publicize the 2010 Affordable Care Act. Ascension Health, a Catholic health-care system, and the nonprofit hospital and insurance company Kaiser Permanente were also urged to lend support, though no financial contributions were requested, Sebelius told lawmakers at a hearing today in Washington. All three companies are subject to oversight by Sebelius's agency, the Health and Human Services Department. J&J, the world's biggest maker of health-care products, falls most under her thumb as the Food and Drug Administration is responsible for approving the New Brunswick, New Jersey-based company's medicines and devices. Congressional Republicans are exploring whether it's appropriate for the health secretary to solicit companies she oversees. "I have promoted and discussed outreach activities not only around the partnership with Enroll America but dozens of organizations for a very long time," Sebelius said in response to questions from Republican members of the House Education and the Workforce Committee. HHS had previously acknowledged that Sebelius phoned two organizations her agency doesn't regulate, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and H&R Block Inc. to ask for financial contributions to the nonprofit, Enroll America. Government Pressure Sebelius told the committee that she has talked to many organizations since the passage of the Affordable Care Act, including drug companies, hospitals and health insurers, "about using whatever resources they have to help fulfill what I consider to be an incredible opportunity for up to 30 million Americans to have affordable health care." "So if health-care officials say they felt pressure to make donations to Enroll America, your response would be what, that they're just too easily pressured or they misunderstood the conversation?" U.S. Representative Trey Gowdy, a Republican from South Carolina, asked Sebelius. "I can't answer what they felt," Sebelius said, repeating that she didn't talk about fundraising.