"It took 13 years, but Elizabeth Warren is at long last acknowledging that ObamaCare has increased healthcare prices and industry consolidation. Who would have believed it? Government price controls and profit caps have resulted in unintended consequences," The Wall Street Journal editorial board said in a recent article.
They reached these conclusions after the Massachusetts senator wrote a letter with her colleague Mike Braun (R-Ind.) criticizing healthcare companies for evading existing federal regulations.
According to the former presidential candidate, health insurers are "dodging ObamaCare’s medical loss ratio (MLR)," thereby generating "sky-high prescription drug costs and excessive corporate profits."
According to the WSJ analysis, the aforementioned rule "spurred insurers to merge with or acquire pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), retail and specialty pharmacies, and healthcare providers."
"In functioning markets, generic drugs cost 80 to 85 percent less than their name-brand equivalents, giving patients much-needed relief from high drug costs and saving taxpayer dollars. But patients – including patients in public health care programs like Medicare and Medicaid – who either use or are compelled to use vertically integrated specialty pharmacies are not seeing this relief," the senators continued.
"By owning every link in the chain, a conglomerate like UnitedHealth Group – which includes an insurer, a PBM, a pharmacy, and physician practices – can send inflated medical payments to its pharmacy. Then, by realizing those payments on the pharmacy side – the side that charges for care – rather than the insurance side, the insurance line of business appears to be in compliance with MLR requirements, while keeping more money for itself," they explained.
Warren defended President Obama's signature legislation repeatedly, particularly when the 2017 Republican majority tried unsuccessfully to repeal and replace it. Donald Trump would have been able to do so it if it had not been for John McCain (R-Ariz.), the senator who decided at the last minute to vote against it.
Warren even went so far as to advocate for a public option during her 2020 presidential bid, claiming she would finance it by raising taxes on the "rich" and "corporations." Among other things, she proposed raising $8.8 trillion through a tax on employers.
