February 27, 2023

Will Uncle Sam Be the Only Customer in Healthcare?

18 minutes

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The US is often called a free market health care system. But Medicare and Medicaid are the biggest insurers, and the government pays for about half of all healthcare. The private sector is getting the message, with some big players –like Humana—ignoring private customers altogether.

Are we on a one way train to single payer? Will innovation suffer? And if government pays all the bills, should it own all the hospitals, physician practices and drug companies, too?

In this episode of CareTalk, John and David share how they feel about the government being the main customer for healthcare.

TOPICS:
(0:56) Humana’s big move pulling out of the employer market
(4:00) Break down of the role of the government in healthcare over the past few decades
(8:37) Do employer-led or private foundation led initiatives have an opportunity for meaningful influence on their own?
(12:45) What can we learn from healthcare markets overseas?
(15:40) What is the closet example to a true free-market-system?
(16:00) What will be the impact on promising, but sometimes expensive new technologies?

ABOUT CARETALK
CareTalk is a weekly podcast that provides an incisive, no B.S. view of the US healthcare industry. Join co-hosts John Driscoll (President U.S. Healthcare and EVP, Walgreens Boots Alliance) and David Williams (President, Health Business Group) as they debate the latest in US healthcare news, business and policy.

Dive deeper into this episode and read our article, "Is the US Headed Towards a Single- Payer Healthcare System?

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