The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI), a new entity created by the Affordable Care Act to increase efficiency, is instead frittering away money, says Sen. Orrin Hatch.
The wasted money is going to high salaries and fancy perks, the Utah Republican said Wednesday during a Finance Committee hearing,
The Hill reports. Hatch said he has "heard that . . . staffers have state-of-the-art workspaces, including very expensive treadmill desks."
The CMMI has a $10 billion budget to study new methods for increasing the efficiency of the healthcare system. Much of its money goes to exploratory projects and outside research that don’t progress quickly.
But Hatch said the projects take an excessive amount of time and duplicate the work of the Medicare and Medicaid agencies.
"I hope that CMMI takes the time to really study the impact of initiatives both while they are going on and at the end of demonstrations, so that we know if they work — and how well they work — before the initiatives are offered to more providers and patients," he said.
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