Health care analysts say it’s possible for Harris to slow the momentum of consolidation by blocking future mergers that could lead to higher prices and lower-quality care.
US Vice President and 2024 Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris delivers remarks before departing George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Texas, on Aug. 1, 2024, as she returns to Washington, DC. When Kamala Harris was California’s top prosecutor, she was concerned that mergers among hospitals, physician groups, and health insurers could thwart competition and lead to higher prices for patients.
“It’s hard to unscramble the eggs,” said Bob Town, an economics professor at the University of Texas. Harris, as California’s attorney general from 2011 to 2017, jump-started health care investigations and enforcement. Though it often gets a bad rap, consolidation in health care also confers benefits. Many doctors choose to join large organizations because it relieves them of the administrative headaches and financial burdens of running their own practices. And being absorbed into a large health system can be a lifeline for financially troubled hospitals.
At the federal level, any effort to blunt anticompetitive mergers would depend in part on how aggressive the FTC is in pursuing the most egregious cases. FTC Chair Lina Khan has made the FTC more proactive in this regard. new merger guidelines, which suggested the federal government would scrutinize deals more closely and take a broader view of which ones violate antitrust laws.
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