Murphy To For-Profit Hospitals: Stop Gouging The Uninsured

Press Release

Today, in response to an alarming new study that appeared in Health Affairs, U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), a member of the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, called on the Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of the 50 U.S. hospitals with the highest markups to immediately institute more reasonable charges for their patients. In a letter addressed to the hospitals' CEOs and the CEOs of the hospitals' parent companies, Murphy stressed that these 50 hospitals have unjustifiably inflated their prices by more than one thousand percent above the Medicare-allowable cost for their most vulnerable, low or no income patients. Murphy also raised important questions about the potential pricing abuses within investor-owned hospitals and within certain hospital systems, citing that 49 of these 50 hospitals are for-profit institutions, and that 39 of these 50 hospitals are owned by just two investor-owned operators.

"I write today with serious concerns about an alarming new study regarding the incredibly high markup that your hospital has been charging vulnerable patients, including the uninsured. Your hospital inflated prices for some of the most vulnerable patients by more than one thousand percent above the price you get paid by Medicare. Given that uninsured patients are normally of low or no income, this practice seems particularly outrageous and immoral. I understand that the health care industry is changing as reimbursements shift towards value-based care instead of volume, but this defies logic. I urge you to immediately rectify the situation by instituting reasonable charges for these patients," Murphy wrote.

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