Spartz Introduces Healthcare Bills to Improve Hospital Competition

Yesterday, U.S. Rep. Victoria Spartz introduced several healthcare bills to improve hospital competition and healthcare value.

“The current hospital price situation is unacceptable and unsustainable,” said Rep. Spartz. “We, as a government, created this powerful monopoly problem, and now owe it to the American people to fix it.”

Based on RAND studies performed by the Employers’ Forum of Indiana, Indiana has some of the highest prices of healthcare in the nation and significant hospital market consolidation.

These first seven bills are part of a package aiming to address material hospital monopoly issue, which: repeal Obamacare prohibitions on physician-owned hospitals; improve oversight of anticompetitive behaviors of non-profit hospitals; require transparency and eliminate abuses in hospital billing; provide more patient choice; improve competition on state healthcare markets; assess anticompetitive clauses in healthcare contracts; and improve availability of medical residency programs.

Rep. Spartz is working to introduce additional bills later this month to improve transparency of non-profit hospital reporting and associations.

“Congresswoman Spartz is leading the fight to lower health costs and put money back into the pockets of hard-working Americans with her legislation. To further promote competition, Congress should adopt these bills to set the right conditions for market rivalries. The result could be electric, reducing the price of medical services, and lowering premiums significantly,” said Joel White, President of Council for Affordable Health Coverage.

“For over 30 years, NFIB small business owners have identified the cost of health insurance as the number one, long-term small business problem. We appreciate Representative Spartz’s work to address underlying cost drivers of health insurance and increase healthcare competition. We look forward to continuing to work with her on this important effort.” said Mitch Relfe, Manager of Federal Health Policy, National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB).

“ERIC applauds Congresswoman Spartz for tackling anti-competitive practices so that workers, retirees, and their families will not have to pay artificially high “hospital” rates for visits to physician offices. We are encouraged that this site-neutral approach will focus medical billing practices on the location of care, and not on who owns the physician’s practice” said Annette Guarisco Fildes, CEO of The ERISA Industry Committee

“Health coverage is extremely important for working Americans as they face high health care costs. The Partnership for Employer-Sponsored Coverage (P4ESC) commends Rep. Spartz for introducing extensive reforms to help make hospital and hospital-linked care more affordable for employees and their families,” said Neil Trautwein, P4ESC Executive Director.

For more information, please visit Spartz.House.Gov.