WASHINGTON, March 14 (UPI) -- The Bush administration is backing a plan to make public how much the government pays hospitals and doctors for common procedures, a report said Tuesday.
The price information will be posted on Medicare's Web site, medicare.gov, in several weeks, The Wall Street Journal reported.
It will be augmented later with regional, as well as quality comparisons, drawn from Medicare, Medicaid and healthcare programs for federal workers and military personnel, the newspaper reported.
"People deserve to know, they have a right to know the quality of the care they receive and its cost," said Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt.
The administration hopes the information will produce more transparency in healthcare prices, but hospitals said it would be of little use to most people.
