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GM Boss To Call for National Rx Plan

Washington DC July 12, 2006; The AIADA newsletter reported that GM Chairman and CEO Rick Wagoner will call for universal access to affordable prescription drugs when he testifies before a U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging today, reports The Detroit News.

GM's prescription drug costs have more than tripled in the past 12 years to $1.9 billion in 2005. Wagoner today will push for a "vigorous and robust competitive prescription drug market where everyone has access to affordable pharmaceuticals," including generic drugs.

Wagoner will also call for policies that give patients and their doctors better information about the effectiveness of specific drugs and treatments.

"Quite simply, we need greater value for our health care dollar," Wagoner says in the statement. "We need a high-quality health system that is productive, efficient and error-free."

Wagoner is also expected to endorse several measures of improving efficiency in the health care system, including the release of Medicare data on the claims made by individual doctors, in turn allowing companies to determine which doctors do the best job and what they are charging.