In order to stay on top of the endless health care tragedies going on around the country I read countless health blogs and I'm on what seem like a hundred email lists.
Reports on all the outrages pour into my email account.
Today, an article the New York Times describes the leveraged buyout of the Frist-owned HCA. If you required any more evidence that your health is for sale--that American health care is all about Wall Street profits, this should dispel any doubt.
A similar situation already exists in Northern California which helps explains why the Frist buyout is so deadly.
The bigger questions remains, why is this bad for you and me? Why is this bad for the health of the nation?
Most important why will this result in the further erosion of health care, skyrocketing costs and add to the ranks of the uninsured?
If you follow me, I'll try to explain.
HCA, the nation's largest for-profit hospital operator, was close to a deal last night to sell itself to a consortium of private equity investors for about $21 billion, people involved in the talks said. The investors would also take on about $10.6 billion of HCA's debt, making the deal the largest leveraged buyout in history.
The buyout group is led by Thomas Frist Sr., the founder of HCA, and his son, Thomas F. Frist Jr., who are, respectively, the father and brother of Senator Bill Frist, the majority leader. The other investors are Bain Capital, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Company and Merrill Lynch's private equity arm, these people said.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
If you go the HCA Website, you'll notice a map of the United States which shows the locations of HCA hospitals. Most are located in the Southeast and West. This is the mission statement from the HCA investor web page.
HCA owns and operates approximately 182 hospitals and approximately 94 freestanding surgery centers in 22 states, England and Switzerland. We are dedicated to providing healthcare services that meet each community's local healthcare needs. We seek to integrate various services to deliver patient care with maximum quality and efficiency. Our approach includes focusing on quality; streamlining operations; sharing technology, equipment and personnel where appropriate; and using economies of scale when contracting for medical supplies and administrative services.
http://phx.corporate-ir.net/...
What is left unsaid, is the effect of consolidation and mergers on health care and skyrocketing health care costs.
Take a look at what's happening in Northern California.
Just substitute HCA for Sutter Health and you'll understand exactly what the Frist Family is up to, and why it's lethal medicine.
Sutter Health's aggressive pricing strategy is having harmful effects on consumers across Northern California.
Through mergers and acquisitions, Sutter has become the largest health system in Northern California. The company uses its monopoly-like control to demand high prices from consumers in order to boost its profits. Sutter's exorbitant prices have prompted sharp reactions from individual consumers and institutional health care purchasers like CalPERS, which report that Sutter's high prices are contributing to steep increases in health premiums. Health insurance premiums in California have grown by nearly 40% in just the past three years, according to a survey of California employers performed by the Kaiser Family Foundation.
Though a non-profit (some would argue a non-profit in name only) Van Johnson, Sutter Health's chief executive officer received $1.94 million salary before he retired to to work as a mission president for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. You can read more about this good man here:http://www.sfgate.com/...
This is what the Sacramento Bee reports about Sutter.
Taking on hospitals and doctors will be more problematic, experts said. They questioned how much leverage CalPERS can have in Northern California, where Sutter and Catholic Healthcare West dominate the hospital market.
"The Northern California hospitals have been very much more able to extract higher reimbursements from the insurance companies," Spetz said.
http://www.sacbee.com/...
Higher reimbursements from the insurance companies. What does this mean for you and me? Higher premiums. What happens when premiums increase? People drop their coverage, as essentially useless as it is, and join the ranks of the uninsured. Shitty insurance is still better than no insurance.
Bill Frist knows why we have 47 million Americans who lack access to basic health care.
Why are Sutter's prices so high. Bill Frist has these answers as well.
This is from Sutter Watch:
Through mergers and acquisitions, Sutter has become the largest health system in Northern California. Sutter uses its monopoly-like control over many hospitals and physician groups to demand high prices from consumers in order to boost the company's profits.
Sutter uses an aggressive bargaining strategy that leverages its overwhelming market power in particular geographic regions to win high priced contracts for all of its facilities. HMOs and insurance companies are forced to negotiate with Sutter in regions where Sutter controls the hospital market. Sutter's control is so dominant in some markets that insurance companies virtually have no other option. For example, Sutter controls the only non-Kaiser hospitals in Marin County. When HMOs and insurance companies seek to contract with Sutter's Marin County hospitals, Sutter forces them to contract with all of Sutter's hospitals and physician groups throughout Northern California.
http://www.suttercorporatewatch.com/...
Returning to the Frist-owned HCA. Wall Street sees it as a great growth opportunity.
The potential deal for HCA appears to be driven by trends both on Wall Street and in the health care industry. For one thing, the private equity business -- in which investment companies pool capital from investors in order to buy companies and then sell them or take them public -- is swimming in cash. And it is eager to invest in a company like HCA, which generates significant revenue and is perceived, based on its stock price, as being undervalued by investors.
It seems apparent that Frist Family and Wall Street like the Sutter Model and are using it.
Welcome to health care in America. Your health and mine is for sale to the highest bidder.
Soon this cruel system will implode. Health care is a basic human right--the health of the nation is also an issue of national security.
Soon the American people will recognize that health care cannot be traded like gold futures on Wall Street.