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    aco reach

    Advocates protest Medicare Advantage

    Washington Complicity in Half-Century Privatization of Medicare

    Since passage of the 1965 Medicare law, special interests inside and outside of government have continually bent the intent of Medicare in order to maximize corporate profits at the expense of taxpayers, seniors, and the disabled.

    Michele Swenson
    Jun 03, 2024

    The authors of "The Privatization of Everything: How the Plunder of Public Goods Transformed America..." describe the corporate campaign to turn public goods and services into private profit-centers, paralleling the U.S. half-century $50 trillion wealth transfer upward. Promoting increasing commodification of healthcare, the U.S. is the only developed nation to place profiteering middlemen between patients and providers. Corporate/Wall St. exploitation of U.S. healthcare as a cash cow since 1980 has contributed to higher health costs and worse outcomes than other advanced nations.

    A 1971 Oval Office conversation between President Nixon and John Ehrlichman augured misplaced healthcare priorities. Extolling the Kaiser CEO's profit-seeking, Ehrlichman enthused: "All the incentives are toward less medical care, because the less care they give them, the more money they make."

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    Opinion
    medicare
    A senior woman is pictured in an intensive care unit

    Why Are Corporate Healthcare Fraudsters Being Handed 'Get Out of Jail Free Cards'?

    Waivers given by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services allow venture capital, private equity, and health insurance entities the freedom to violate anti-corruption laws without penalty.

    Kay Tillow
    Jun 12, 2023

    The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), the federal agency that oversees those national health care programs, has the dubious distinction of being light years ahead of other government regulators in excusing fraudulent conduct. CMS doesn’t just allow healthcare companies to repeatedly commit fraud and abuse with fines amounting to a tiny fraction of the profit; CMS goes much further.

    CMS formally authorizes the violation of anti-corruption laws by granting “fraud and abuse” waivers to the corporate entities involved in experimental programs within its Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI or Innovation Center).

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    Opinion
    privatization
    U.S. President Joe Biden speaks about protecting Medicare

    No Amount of Fraud Deters Government Agencies When It Comes to Privatizing Medicare

    Sadly, getting the fraudsters out of ACO REACH will not improve a program designed to enrich corporations and harm patients. This entire apple cart needs to be overturned.

    Ana Malinow
    Kay Tillow
    Feb 01, 2023

    On January 17, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) announced 48 new model participants in a controversial pilot program called Accountable Care Organization: Realizing Equity, Access, and Community Health, better known as ACO REACH. CMMI, created by the Affordable Care Act, is supposed to test alternative payment models for Traditional Medicare to lower costs and improve, or at least not worsen, the care of 30 million seniors and people with disabilities.

    The program, launched in the waning days of the Trump Administration as Direct Contracting, was greenlighted by the Biden Administration in 2021 and renamed ACO REACH in 2022. The model, which started with 53 contracting entities under Trump has grown to 132 participants with 131,772 health care practitioners and organizations providing care to over 2 million beneficiaries on Traditional Medicare under President Biden. Startling research found many of the ACO REACH participants have a history of Medicare fraud. Nevertheless, Medicare continues to sign contracts with them.

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    Opinion
    medicare

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