Senate deal on public option draws praise from Obama President Obama praised Senate Democrats on Wednesday for producing "a creative new framework" to provide coverage to uninsured Americans without relying on a government insurance option. "I support this effort, especially since it's aimed at increasing choice and competition and lowering cost," Obama said at a health-care event near the White House, attended by several Senate Democrats. The response Wednesday to the compromise plan was generally positive among Democrats. But some lawmakers are raising concerns about a Medicare buy-in program for individuals age 55 and older. That proposal aims to provide an affordable coverage option for low-income older adults, but hospital and doctor groups have warned that they could be big losers, since Medicare pays much lower rates than does private insurers. Senate Democrats are scheduled to hold a special caucus late Wednesday afternoon to discuss the status of their $848 billion health care bill. Senior Democratic aides said Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) was preparing to send a "manager's amendment" to the Congressional Budget Office for a cost analysis as early as Wednesday night. The package would wrap together all the perks, favors and other loose ends that must be resolved in Reid's quest to secure 60 votes for final passage. The compromise came together Tuesday night as Democratic Senate negotiators struck a tentative agreement to drop the controversial government-run insurance plan from the bill, hoping that would remove a last major roadblock standing in the way of a final vote in the chamber. Under the agreement, the government plan preferred by liberals would be replaced with the Medicare buy-in and a program that would create several national insurance policies administered by private companies but negotiated by the Office of Personnel Management, which oversees health policies for federal workers. If private firms were unable to deliver acceptable national policies, a government plan would be created. In addition, private insurance companies would face stringent new regulations, including a requirement that they spend at least 90 cents of every dollar they collect in premiums on medical services for their customers. The announcement followed six days of negotiations among 10 Democrats -- five liberals and five moderates -- appointed by Reid to work out differences on the public option and other pressing issues. Appearing in the Capitol with Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), the leader of the liberal faction, and Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), representing moderates, Reid hailed the deal as a broad agreement that has the potential to "overcome a real problem that we had" and push the measure to final Senate vote before Christmas. Reid's challenge will be to convert at least five moderate-to-conservative members of the Democratic caucus who oppose a public option, without alienating liberals, who have championed the issue as their leading reform goal. One undecided lawmaker Reid is courting, Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, a Connecticut independent, has declared he will not back a bill that includes a public option in any form. But in a statement after Tuesday's deal was struck, Lieberman suggested that he may be warming to the bill. "I am encouraged by the progress toward a consensus," Lieberman said. Senators said they would examine ways to change the Medicare buy-in proposal, to make it acceptable to all Democrats and possibly Sen. Olympia J. Snowe (Maine), the only Republican to support the Senate reform effort. Snowe has expressed concerns about a Medicare buy-in, because of the potential harm to local health care providers. But she and others, including Budget Chairman Kent Conrad of North Dakota, said they are willing to discuss such a Mprogram, so long as states with especially low Medicare reimbursement rates were taken care of and a mechanism was adopted to ensure that Medicare would not be adversely impacted financially. Among the options on the second point: Setting up a separate pool for the presumably sicker buy-in population; making the buy-in program a temporary bridge to 2014, when the exchanges start; and requiring the buy-in population to pay additional premiums if their care proves to be more costly than is first estimated.