HCR Bill Spurs Mergers, Fears of Monopolies, & Higher Health Care Prices

[amborin]

Consumer Risks Feared as Health Law Spurs Mergers


.....Now, eight months into the new law there is a growing frenzy of mergers involving hospitals, clinics and doctor groups eager to share costs and savings, and cash in on the incentives. They, in turn, have deployed a small army of lawyers and lobbyists trying to persuade the Obama administration to relax or waive a body of older laws intended to thwart health care monopolies, and to protect against shoddy care and fraudulent billing of patients or Medicare.

Consumer advocates fear that the health care law could worsen some of the very problems it was meant to solve — by reducing competition, driving up costs and creating incentives for doctors and hospitals to stint on care, in order to retain their cost-saving bonuses.

“The new law is already encouraging a wave of mergers, joint ventures and alliances in the health care industry,” said Prof. Thomas L. Greaney, an expert on health and antitrust law at St. Louis University. “The risk that dominant providers and dominant insurers may exercise their market power, individually or jointly, has never been greater.”

snip

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/21/health/policy/21health.html?src=me&ref=general

[BzaDem]

1. That is a pretty bad job of selectively quoting the article. Berwick provides a much better take.

A better summary quote would be:

"Dr. Donald M. Berwick, the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, hails the benefits of “integrated care.” But, Dr. Berwick said, “we need to assure both patients and society at large that destructive, exploitative and costly forms of collusion and monopolistic behaviors do not emerge and thrive, disguised as cooperation.”"

In other words, there are pluses (efficiency, lower costs) and minuses (greater pricing power) to integrated care, and HCR needs to be implemented in a way to strengthen the pluses and minimize the minuses.

And remember, Berwick is the one who consistently praises Britian's NHS.