US GAO chief backs Bush Medicare plan

US Comptroller General David Walker has warned Congress that, without"meaningful entitlement reforms" to Medicare, the effects of demographics and growing health care expenditures could drive the USA back to a period of escalating deficits and debt.

Mr Walker who, as head of the General Accounting Office is effectively Congress' chief accountant, backed several of President George W Bush's Medicare reform proposals, including using private competition to cut costs and combining the Medicare hospital coverage and outpatient services accounts, reports Reuters.

He told Members of Congress that a prescription benefit should not be added to Medicare without the introduction, at the same time, of reforms to Medicare's overall structure aimed at cutting costs. Moreover, he said, the introduction of properly-structured reforms to promote competition among health care plans could help make beneficiaries more cost-conscious, noting the "huge gap" which exists between the benefits which the program's enrollees have come to expect and those which it will be able to afford in future.