The "Surprising Reason", according the story: "The problem is private insurers."
I'm sure that's a factor, but there's more to it: https://www.texasobserver.org/critical-condition/
I'm sure that's a factor, but there's more to it: https://www.texasobserver.org/critical-condition/
One of the big ways that cost containment has been done is forcing more efficiency. That should be a good thing, right? Except that small rural hospitals will never, ever be as efficient as large urban ones. And the "disproportionate share" (overly large amounts of Medicare/Medicaid patients) payments aren't enough to keep those places open. So while it's definitely saved money, that's not much help when you live an hour or more away from any healthcare facility.
The real answer is, and always will be, shifting the model entirely away from that to capitated models and better care model incentives (instead of incentives based around just ordering more shit for patients). It’s also an easy way to account for better geographic distribution.
That said, you’re also not solving rural healthcare without dramatically increasing the number of providers, so the revenue models are only going to get you so far regardless.
MAGA is a death cult. Everything they do accelerates the demise of their way of life and communities.
Blaming United or whatever is memeworthy, but it’s also the easy and only partially correct answer.
The articles argument is that private insurers need to cover medicare/medicaid costs, which seems silly. It also seems to ignore the obvious question in my mind, which is maybe rural hospitals just have to run leaner to meet market demands. It makes me wonder if there's a reason rural hospitals pull large investments, such as regulation demanding unattainably high levels of care, forcing them to be unprofitable.
IMO this is the missing gap in a lot of the US economy. Cars, housing, medical care. Kei trucks, SRO apartments, and so many more similar solutions are functionally illegal.