Small, Piecemeal Mergers in Health Care Fly Under Regulators’ Radars
(from NY Times)
Federal
officials are expected to argue in court starting Monday that a large
hospital merger in the Chicago area could hurt consumers and should be
stopped. It would be the latest in a series of efforts by regulators to
push back against a wave of consolidation among major health care
providers.
But a frenzy of smaller transactions is also profoundly changing the landscape, many of which face little regulatory resistance.
The
deals are often for a couple of doctors here, or a hospital there,
making them too small to attract much attention. But as those deals add
up, they are creating groups that in some cases dominate local or
regional markets. And they are raising questions about whether the gaze
of antitrust officials is directed in the right place.