There’s a long-simmering debate within the healthcare business on whether or not we should always lower out well being insurers because the middlemen in paying for checkups, prescribed drugs, procedures and extra. Regardless of paying month-to-month charges, well being plan members should pay 1000’s in premiums, which may result in vital out-of-pocket prices for prescription medicine and medical visits. The most recent episode of the Debunked podcast explores an ongoing debate on this subject led by investor Mark Cuban, which spilled onto social media channel X. It additionally devoted consideration to the turmoil on the Division of Well being and Human Providers on Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr.’s watch, notably on the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention. MedCity Information Editor in Chief Arundhati Parmar co-hosts the podcast with Samir Batra, managing associate of Well being Innovation Pitch.
Arundhati and Samir mentioned whether or not payers have been gaming the well being system by benefiting from a public who might not absolutely perceive their medical insurance choices or the implications of selecting one plan over one other, which may result in surprising out-of-pocket prices to pay premiums.
“The system just isn’t set as much as help patient-doctor [price] negotiations,” Samir mentioned. He pointed to a rising development of subscription-based main care companies supplied by means of firms like One Medical, which Amazon acquired in 2023.
The dialog moved to Kennedy’s chaotic management at HHS. Regardless of assurances made to U.S. Senators that Kennedy would go away vaccine suggestions in place, he has made a number of modifications to longstanding vaccine coverage. He did away with a advice for the Covid-19 vaccine to pregnant girls and ladies nursing youngsters beneath 6 months outdated. Susan Monarez, the previous Senate-confirmed director of the CDC, was ousted over her vaccine coverage stance, which prompted different CDC executives to resign in protest. Kennedy additionally changed a board overseeing vaccine coverage with vaccine skeptics. In 2025, there have been 1,431 confirmed measles circumstances in 41 states, largely youngsters — the biggest variety of circumstances in a 12 months since 2000, when the illness was declared eradicated within the U.S.
Epic’s announcement that it’s creating lots of of various AI bots to help clinicians, payers and sufferers at its annual Customers Group Assembly sparked a dialogue on the ramifications of this information, primarily that it may shut out competitors from its app market due to its dominance as an EHR vendor.
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