Opinion: The much-maligned ‘quality-adjusted life year’ is a vital tool for health care policy
A new bill that would ban government use of quality-adjusted life years is misguided.
Health policy circles have erupted in debate over a wonky administrative tool: the quality-adjusted life year (QALY) and similar metrics to value and price drugs and other health interventions. Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) has warned of the potential for these approaches to discriminate, arguing that “All lives are worth living. It’s unconscionable that a health care bureaucracy would so callously determine that someone’s life is worth less,” suggesting that use of QALYs discriminates against individuals with greater disease burden.
In January, McMorris Rodgers introduced the Protecting Health Care for All Patients Act, which would ban government use of QALYs. McMorris Rodgers is right to be concerned about discrimination in health care decisions. However, the Protecting Health Care for All Patients Act, which should soon head to markup, unfairly targets an important tool that can help to improve allocation of health care resources, at a fair price, for the purpose of helping everyone, including people with disabilities.
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