AUSTIN — Today, the Texas Public Policy Foundation released new research examining healthcare costs in Texas. This report confirms that healthcare costs are rising because opaque pricing, consolidation, anti-competitive practices, and administrative control limit patient choice and weaken market competition.
The report recommends that Texas should pursue transformational healthcare reform by expanding transparency, restoring patient purchasing power, creating ACA alternatives, strengthening HSAs and portable benefits, reducing drug middlemen, enforcing antitrust laws, banning anti-competitive practices, and protecting physician-led medical decision-making.
“Our current healthcare system isn’t serving patients or physicians as well as it should,” said Brooke Garner, Healthcare Policy Scholar. “Patients and employers need clear disclosure of actual prices, fees, commissions, conflicts of interest, and facility charges.”
“Texas has addressed healthcare transparency problems one law at a time, but incremental fixes cannot repair a fundamentally broken market.” said Dr. Clifford Porter, Senior Fellow for Healthcare Policy. “Instead, Texas should pursue transformational healthcare reform. Reform that promotes greater competition, transparency, and accountability would place downward pressure on prices, improve access, and allow medical decisions to be driven by patient needs rather than government or corporate financial incentives.”