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Health Care Policy Center

Best health care political pull can buy

"While Obamacare is suppressing genuine marketplace competition for medical services, it is also spurring a more sinister facsimile of competition - for political favors." - Paul Hsieh, MD.

Last week the Washington Times published an excellent article by Paul Hsieh, MD: “Best health care political pull can buy.”  Writes Dr. Hsieh:

As a result of Obamacare, fewer physicians will work in the familiar two- to five-person small-group practices most Americans prefer. Instead, doctors will be increasingly driven into large, impersonal “accountable care organizations” – not to take better care of their patients, but simply to survive economically.

Read more on the dangers of so-called “accountable care organizations.” My take is that they make doctors accountable, not to patients, but to government bureaucrats.

Dr. Hsieh continues:

Obamacare … also spurring a more sinister facsimile of competition – for political favors. Employers and insurers with sufficient political clout can save money by obtaining a much-coveted “waiver,” exempting them from onerous new insurance regulations. …

Nor will the political favor-seeking be limited to insurance waivers. If the Obamacare individual insurance mandate survives current legal challenges, it will also spur a lobbying frenzy from special-interest groups seeking to include their pet benefits in the mandatory insurance package Americans must purchase.

Read the whole article: Best health care political pull can buy.