Healthcare reform

WASHINGTON, Oct. 30 (UPI) -- The U.S. House of Representatives' healthcare reform bill would cost more than $1 trillion, the Congressional Budget Office said.

While House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said the 1,990-page reform measure would come in under U.S. President Barack Obama's $900 billion ceiling for reform. It makes that hurdle when penalties expected to be accessed to individual who don't buy health insurance and companies that don't provide that option to employees are factored in.

However, the CBO figure leaves out $245 billion needed to keep Medicare from reducing payments to doctors. House Democrats said they would use another bill to address that.

The CBO report -- warned to be "subject to substantial uncertainty" -- said the House bill would increase taxes about $570 billion and cut about $425 billion in the next 10 years from programs such as Medicare Advantage. Those would result in a $104 billion reduction in the federal deficit over 10 years.