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There are a lot of opponents to price transparency. Here are are some of the main reasons against it.
A transparent system would expose doctors and hospitals that are abusing the system. It wouldn’t be fair to them. All that training! How can we in good conscience expose them. This argument is essentially one you will hear from lobbyist organizations and people loyal to the AMA.
What do you think? Would it be fair to expose those that are abusing the system or should it be covered up?
We don’t want transparency because people will come to false conclusions. For example, a doctor that treats more complex cases might charge more for the same thing. They are in fact providing a better service to people, but the data won’t show that. In other words, a great doctor might be harmed by the data.
The price transparency data will just be dumped into the marketplace. We don’t support data dumping. Of course, it sounds like you’re going to the bathroom to take a dump. Opponents of transparency framed the wording in this way to make transparency seem distasteful.
The data will have to be cleaned up! It’s useless data! It will cost people a lot of money to clean up the data and nobody will know what they are looking at. You can hear them calling.
Third parties will clean the data at their own cost. Many people want this data. Not to mention, the data is already cleaned up and in usable format, it is just controlled and not released. At least we are getting some data.
If we didn’t have the most expensive health care system in the world that denies so many people, these points might carry some weight. The glaring reality is that the system is broken. Hiding data to protect inefficient doctors and hospitals is just making the problem worse.
Insurance companies and hospitals have been advocating transparency for themselves for a very long time. The real issue is should the consumer have access to the same data. Business says, No. The people say, Yes!
Link to get Medicare data: https://data.medicare.gov