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Private-equity practice
is bad for patients
Re: “Hospitals cash in on a private equity-backed trend: concierge physician care” (April 5)
The concierge physician care highlighted in the article does more harm than good for patients. Hospital consolidation drives inequities by increasing the cost of care without corresponding increases in quality. Furthermore, concierge physician care reduces the availability of primary care physicians as each concierge physician serves a few hundred patients versus thousands.
Patients should not have to face 30% to 50% higher spending for their health care without any difference in their health outcomes.
Health policy should address the increasing rise in hospital consolidation to ensure that Americans are getting the care at the price and quality they deserve. Proposed bills such as AB 3129 are crucial for addressing health care system consolidation and tackling issues such as this.
These private equity-backed practices cannot continue without oversight and intervention. We must ensure that patient care comes above all and that health systems are accountable.
Navya Pariti
Berkeley
Justice doesn’t seem
to apply to Musk
Re: “Tesla settles fatality suit just prior to court trial” (Page B1, April 10).
How is it possible that Elon Musk has not been charged over all the people who have died because of Tesla’s “autopilot”? How is it possible that the sale of any Tesla vehicle has not been blocked? If you advertise “full self-driving” and people use it as such, you can’t hide behind fine print that says that it’s not actually a full self-driving vehicle. If I sell a product calling it a “car” and then write somewhere that to operate it you need to use your feet like in the Flintstones car, that’s a scam and I should be punished for it.
I’m from Europe and always complained about the politicians there, but they act a thousand times faster than U.S. ones when it comes to regulating tech companies and limiting how they hurt society for profit.
Roberto Garuti
Walnut Creek
Source: www.mercurynews.com