Government
Members named to federal comparative effectiveness council
NEWS IN BRIEF — Posted March 30, 2009
The Dept. of Health and Human Services on March 19 announced that nine physicians are members of a 15-person panel that will guide $1.1 billion in federal funding for comparative effectiveness research.
The panel is charged with advising President Obama and Congress on federal priorities for research that examines the effectiveness of different drugs, devices and procedures on treating the same medical condition. The recently enacted stimulus package, which created the council and allocated the $1.1 billion, required at least half of the panel's members to be physicians.
Some Republicans have expressed concern that the council will be able to use the data to dictate coverage in federal programs such as Medicare, but leading Democrats have said that is not their intention nor the goal of the legislation. HHS spokeswoman Jenny Backus said the Federal Coordinating Council for Comparative Effectiveness Research's deliberations will be transparent and open to the public.
The list of council members is available online (link).
Note: This item originally appeared at http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2009/03/30/gvbf0330.htm.
