Through a comprehensive new executive order, President Joe Biden’s goal is anti-competitive behavior in the entire U.S. economy, including the healthcare sector.
The order signed on Friday covers 72 measures aimed at solving competition issues, thereby “reducing family prices, raising workers’ wages, promoting innovation and faster economic growth,” according to the report. Fact sheet to release By the White House.
With regard to medical care in particular, the executive order specifies four areas where lack of competition will lead to price increases and reduce access to quality medical services. These include hospitals, health insurance, prescription drugs and hearing aids.
According to the fact sheet, the integration between the health system and the hospital is causing a series of problems, especially in rural areas.Research shows that integration Push up prices with Has left rural areas There are not enough opportunities for care.
In the past ten years, this trend has been steadily continuing, even if Covid-19 pandemic. Last year, there were 79 transactions involving healthcare M&A, which belonged to the scope of activity in the past 10 years.
Through the executive order, Biden urged the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission to review and revise their combined guidelines from the perspective of preventing patient harm.In addition, he instructed the Ministry of Health and Human Services to support existing Hospital price transparency rules And complete the legislative implementation Prohibit accidental billing.
The fact table points out that for the health insurance industry, integration limits consumer choices. When there is a choice, comparison shopping on the Affordable Care Act exchange is a challenge.
According to the executive order, HHS must standardize the plan options in the national health insurance market so that people can make comparisons more easily.
In addition to providers and payers, integration also has a huge impact on the prescription drug market.
According to the fact sheet, the high prices of prescription drugs in the United States are partly due to the lack of competition among drug manufacturers.To solve this problem, Biden has instructed the Food and Drug Administration to work with states and tribes to safely import prescription drugs from Canada and strengthen The rules of the Trump administrationThe order also requires HHS to issue a comprehensive plan within 45 days to curb high prices and price fraud.
Similarly, in order to solve the problem of expensive hearing aids, Biden has instructed HHS to consider issuing a proposed rule within 120 days to allow hearing aids to be sold over the counter.
“Today’s historic executive order established the efforts of the entire government to promote competition in the American economy,” the fact sheet stated. “Once implemented, these measures will bring tangible improvements to people’s lives.”
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