Right, but they aren’t just operating as an insurance company. They also own and operate the hospital, meaning there has to be a balance between the profitability of the hospital network weighted against the profitability of the insurance company.
In the end, it usually means that there isn’t a competition between the insurance and providers, rather two parties working together to manage cost while providing better service.
Which means it pays to provide preventative care, it pays to educate their patient population, and it pays to provide outcome based medicine.
Vertical integration of healthcare is a lot closer to something like universal care than what you usually see in america. It’s not perfect, but it’s usually better than the current norm.
It’s my understanding that vertical integration is the norm in the US, though. UnitedHealth bought something like 250 companies in 2024 alone. CVS owns Aetna, and MinuteClinic, and Caremark (a PBM), and multiple pharmacy chains, with the result being that they don’t care where in the value chain the money winds up, because it’s still in house at the end of the day. And they certainly aren’t going to fight the other parts of the conglomerate to get a better deal for patients, with the result being that there are no longer incentives (from competition) to cap costs, resulting in the US spending almost 20% of GDP on healthcare.
It also gives them no incentive to try to control the cost of care or negotiate strongly on their customers’ behalf as an insurance company.
Right, but they aren’t just operating as an insurance company. They also own and operate the hospital, meaning there has to be a balance between the profitability of the hospital network weighted against the profitability of the insurance company.
In the end, it usually means that there isn’t a competition between the insurance and providers, rather two parties working together to manage cost while providing better service.
Which means it pays to provide preventative care, it pays to educate their patient population, and it pays to provide outcome based medicine.
Vertical integration of healthcare is a lot closer to something like universal care than what you usually see in america. It’s not perfect, but it’s usually better than the current norm.
It’s my understanding that vertical integration is the norm in the US, though. UnitedHealth bought something like 250 companies in 2024 alone. CVS owns Aetna, and MinuteClinic, and Caremark (a PBM), and multiple pharmacy chains, with the result being that they don’t care where in the value chain the money winds up, because it’s still in house at the end of the day. And they certainly aren’t going to fight the other parts of the conglomerate to get a better deal for patients, with the result being that there are no longer incentives (from competition) to cap costs, resulting in the US spending almost 20% of GDP on healthcare.