From Common Dreams: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/05/17-5
by Deborah Burger
Published on Friday, May 17, 2013 by Common Dreams
If there is one problem that symbolizes the ongoing national healthcare emergency, it is the rampant price gouging in the healthcare industry that continues to price too many Americans out of access to care and into financial ruin. Not only is the problem not solved by the Affordable Care Act, but it is a likely reason many will continue to demand more effective reform, as in expanding and extending Medicare to cover everyone.
Predatory pricing practices can be found nearly everywhere in healthcare, by the drug companies, insurance companies, medical suppliers, outpatient clinics, boutique medical services, and many others as chronicled this spring in Time magazine.
U.S. hospitals are among the biggest abusers, as illuminated in recent data released by Medicare on hospital charges for a variety of common procedures as well as brand new findings by the Institute for Health and Socio-Economic Policy, the research arm of the National Nurses United, based on Medicare cost reports.
The nurses’ data augments the Medicare findings, and goes the next step, illustrating a trend of rising high hospital charges while providing context to a very ugly picture and the deplorable impact on anyone who needs healthcare.
Here’s the sobering numbers:
- · U.S. hospitals charge on average $331 dollars for every $100 of their total costs, in statistical terms a 331 percent charge to cost ratio.
Continue reading at: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/05/17-5
