A number of Congressional committees have held hearings recently on a variety of health policy issues, including the following:

• The Senate Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee held a hearing to examine the proposed Express Scripts/Medco merger;
• The Senate Finance Committee examined “Drug Shortages: Why They Happen and What They Mean”;
• The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held a hearing entitled, “A Medicaid Fraud Victim Speaks Out: What’s Going Wrong and Why”.

Three additional hearings are scheduled for December 15: a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing on prescription drug shortages; a House Small Business Investigations Subcommittee hearing on new medical loss ratio rules; and a Senate Aging Committee hearing on implementing the Physician Payment Sunshine Act (rescheduled from December 8).