An April 25 post on right-wing blog Big Government claims that the Obama administration's “proposal to decrease healthcare costs ... [is] rationing.” The post claims that the Medicare Independent Advisory Board (IPAB) will likely “limit healthcare costs by reducing access to physicians, restricting choice of treatments, [and] restricting access to medication and technology.” However, as Media Matters has previously documented, the Affordable Care Act prohibits the IPAB from making decisions that would “any recommendations to ration health care ... or otherwise restrict benefits.” From the Big Government post:

After months of denial that healthcare reform would involve rationing of healthcare for those who are the most vulnerable, the senior citizens who depend on Medicare, the President has come up with a proposal to decrease healthcare costs and guess what....it's rationing.

Under Obamacare, a 15 member panel known as the Medicare Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) was created to 'oversee healthcare costs'. This panel consists of individuals appointed by the President and confirmed by Congress - two ingredients that make it highly unlikely that they would be truly independent. In addition, there is no requirement that members be practicing physicians which is a recipe for cuts that are highly likely to affect the delivery of quality individualized patient care.

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[I]f the goal [of the IPAB] is to limit healthcare costs by reducing access to physicians, restricting choice of treatments, restricting access to medication and technology, and/or hoping that people will either be to sick or too frustrated to access the system while playing the crony politics of rewarding those who helped craft Obamacare, then it is well on its way.