Of particular interest, the report states that DOD "will continue to ask for congressional authority to change fees and co-pays in an effort to maintain both a generous health care benefit and a fair and reasonable cost-sharing arrangement between beneficiaries and DOD." 2010 Budget

The 2010 Budget submitted by the Obama Administration does not contain legislative proposals to increase Tricare fees and the funding levels requested for the Defense Health Program do not assume savings from such proposals. Other unnamed DOD officials have been reported as saying that DOD's strategy is to link weapons cuts to health care costs and a need for fee increases:
Instead of proposing an increase, Pentagon officials plan to highlight the cancellation or delay of weapons systems and other large cuts in military spending and make an argument that the inability to hold down soaring health care costs is part of the reason for those cuts. The idea, defense officials said, is that Congress may decide on its own that it is time to increase Tricare fees, which have not changed since the Tricare system was introduced in the mid-1990s. A smoking cessation program for non-Medicare eligible Tricare beneficiaries (section 713). However, the FY2010 budget submission does propose to reduce spending for several high profile weapons acquisitions.
The Obama Administration's Fiscal Year 2010 budget submission does not include any proposals to increase fees or copayments for Tricare beneficiaries. Previously, the FY2007, FY2008, and FY2009 budget submissions had proposed increases in Tricare enrollment fees, deductibles, and pharmacy co-payments for retired beneficiaries not yet eligible for Medicare. These actions were justified by DOD as necessary to constrain the growth of health care spending as an increasing proportion of the overall defense budget in the next decade. Congress passed legislation each year to prohibit the proposed fee increases. Defense health care spending remains a significant issue for the DOD. A DOD report published in January, 2009, stated that DOD "will continue to ask for congressional authority to change fees and copays in an effort to maintain both a generous health care benefit and a fair and reasonable cost-sharing arrangement between beneficiaries and DoD." However, DOD's strategy for FY2010 seems to highlight the cancellation or delay of weapons systems and other large cuts in military spending. These cuts, it may be argued, can be attributed to the growing percentage of the DOD budget devoted to medical care, an estimated 8.7%in FY2009. This cost growth, may in turn, be attributed in part to Tricare fee levels, which have not changed since the Tricare system was implemented in 1995.