THE FREE MARKET FAIRY & HEALTH CARE COSTS

I don't think Sean Hannity knows about this, otherwise he wouldn't talk so much about "free market solutions" to health care.

Blowing the Whistle, Many Times
By MARY WILLIAMS WALSH
Published: November 18, 2007
New York Times

(excerpts)

The False Claims Act is a federal law that allows private individuals to sue on behalf of the United States if they believe that they have inside knowledge of a fraud. ... Though enacted to fight war profiteering, the False Claims Act has become a potent weapon in the battle against escalating health care costs. Of the 20 largest False Claims Act recoveries listed on the Web site of Taxpayers Against Fraud, a group that supports whistle-blowers and their lawyers, 19 involved health care companies. (The other involved municipal bonds.)

The biggest single whistle-blower settlement to date was the $900 million that Tenet Healthcare, a hospital company, paid last year to settle accusations of overbilling the Medicare program. That settlement is dwarfed by the $1.7 billion that HCA, another big hospital chain, paid between 2000 and 2003 to settle a number of fraud suits.

For those of you who don't recall, HCA was founded by the father of the former Senate Majority Leader, Bill Frist, aka "cat killer." Frist himself was investigated for illegal insider trading. You can read more about the HCA scandal here.