"The CAP strongly objects to the 9% Medicare cuts to pathologists, which the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) published in the final 2021 Physician Fee Schedule and urges Congress to act quickly to stop these cuts prior to their scheduled January 1 implementation," said CAP President Patrick Godbey, MD, FCAP. "Due to the ongoing public health emergency related to the COVID-19 pandemic, it is especially important Congress take steps to alleviate the CMS’s looming 2021 payment reductions to all non-evaluation and management (E/M) services."
A bipartisan House bill, The Holding Providers Harmless from Medicare Cuts During COVID-19 Act of 2020, has 50 sponsors and counting as a bipartisan group of lawmakers from across the country support stopping these cuts from taking effect. The CAP is urging Congress to pass this legislation before adjourning for the year.
The rule must be changed by Jan. 1, 2021, or the proposed cuts will take effect. The CAP has spent months advocating to convince Congress to waive the budget neutrality requirement and prevent much of the cut.
In his editorial in the December 2020 issue of CAP Today, Dr. Godbey spoke plainly: "This is an access-to-care issue. A number of hospitals are already in trouble because of financial strains from COVID-19. Many of these hospitals serve economically disadvantaged patients, rural areas, and minorities. If specialists can no longer afford to staff these hospitals, then the services they provide, and on which these hospitals depend financially, will not take place. They will be forced to close. These closures will disproportionately affect the most vulnerable of our patients. This decision will come down to the wire, and I hope every day that sanity will prevail."
