White House: Bill will curb health costs

WASHINGTON, Dec. 14 (UPI) -- The Obama administration Monday reassured that healthcare costs would decline over the long run under the reform bill being debated in the U.S. Senate.

Christina Romer, chair of the president's Council on Economic Advisers, told reporters that the Senate bill would push prices higher at first, but would soon settle into a pattern in which costs would decline 1 percent annually.

"Even though we are going to up the level of spending in the short run, by the time you get out five or 10 years, you have a dramatic impact on where we are relative to where we might otherwise have been," Romer said.

Romer predicted that while the number of people covered by Medicare would grow significantly under the plan, the proposed cost-savings in the bill would pay off in the form of reduced spending by the program and reduced premiums for Medicare recipients and likely for private insurance as well.

The predictions were outlined in a new report from the council, which The Washington Post said was dismissed by Republican critics as coming from the same group that had predicted the Obama economic stimulus program would cap unemployment at 8 percent. The jobless rate in November was 10 percent.