**Members of the US Congress are preparing to fight over the details of healthcare reform, as they return to work after the summer recess.**In the senate, Finance Committee chairman Max Baucus has drawn up a new compromise proposal.
And in the House of Representatives, a prominent Democrat has signalled he will not support any bill that includes a publicly run insurance scheme.
President Barack Obama is to address Congress on Wednesday on healthcare.
Passing a healthcare bill is Mr Obama’s top political priority this year.
He called on both chambers of Congress to pass healthcare bills before the summer recess, so that they could spend the autumn reconciling their different versions.
But neither house met Mr Obama’s deadline, amid disagreements over the specifics of healthcare reform.
Bipartisan
In the Senate, the Health Committee approved a plan that would have forced all Americans to get health insurance, while providing subsidies to the less well-off.
HEALTHCARE IN THE US
- 46 million uninsured, 25 million under-insured
- Healthcare costs represent 16% of GDP, almost twice OECD average
- Reform plans would require all Americans to get insurance
- Some propose public insurance option to compete with private insurers
Anger clouds US healthcare debate
It would also have given Americans without employer-provided coverage the chance to sign up for a new publicly-run insurance scheme, the so-called “public option”.
But the other senate committee with responsibility for health legislation - Mr Baucus’s Finance Committee - was unable to agree on a bill.
Mr Baucus was keen to win support from Republicans as well as Democrats for a bill, but the Republicans on the committee, and some moderate Democrats, objected to the proposals to create a “public option”.
Now, Mr Baucus has drawn up a new “framework for consideration”, without a public option, which he hopes will attract bipartisan support.
In the House of Representatives, Democratic leaders made an informal agreement with moderate Democrats - the so-called “Blue-Dog Democrats” - before the summer recess on a healthcare bill that included a public option.
But one of the architects of the deal, “Blue Dog” Mike Ross, announced on Tuesday that he could no longer support a bill that contained a public option.
“I have been sceptical about the public health insurance option from the beginning and used August to get feedback from you, my constituents,” Mr Ross wrote in a newsletter to constituents.
“An overwhelming number of you oppose a government-run health insurance option and it is your feedback that has led me to oppose the public option as well.”