The New York Times recently reported that in the past four years the 18 leading health insurers have combined into six. Consequently, physicians increasingly find themselves at the negotiating table with enormous health plan bureaucracies whose main interest is in the financial bottom line. Physicians' ability to effectively advocate for quality care has been whittled away to the detriment of patients and efficient, effective health care delivery. The result is increasing control over health care by insurers that place cost and profitability before quality and individual patient care. Previous efforts to modify antitrust enforcement policy have failed to level the playing field.
Insurers operate under an antitrust exemption.
Enormous health plan bureaucracies put health plan profits above patient care. Consumers are paying more but getting less. The Quality Health Care Coalition Act would level the playing field by providing individual health professionals the leverage they need to negotiate effectively with health plans. Prospects for this bill in the current Congress are unclear. As the bill would modify antitrust laws, the House Judiciary Committee must act upon it before it will be considered on the House floor.