HHS reg review won’t include new healthcare reform rules

{mosads}Although conservatives have criticized HHS for declining to release a list of waiver denials, subcommittee Chairman Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) said the committee probably won’t release that information, either. HHS has provided updates on denied waiver requests.

“I think if a person flunks health care 101, (he) doesn’t want everybody to know it,” Stearns told reporters.

HHS had denied 79 waiver requests as of mid-February. Unions made up the bulk of those early denials, despite Republican lawmakers’ suggestions that unions have benefitted disproportionately from the process. Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.) repeated that charge Monday, asking whether the administration’s political allies struck a “secret deal with the White House” to get waivers.

The administration has granted nearly 1,400 waivers.