Washington, D.C. — The House Energy and Commerce Committee Subcommittee on Health has convened a hearing titled “Lowering Unaffordable Costs: Examining Transparency and Competition in Health Care.” 

Here is what advocacy groups representing patients, medical professionals, and small businesses are saying: 

Consumers First (A collection of 30 different patient, employer, provider groups): 

“As an alliance that brings together the interests of consumers, employers, labor unions, and primary care clinicians working to realign and improve the fundamental economic incentives and design of the health care system, Consumers First thanks you for being responsive to our call to action and stands ready to support you as you embark on this critical work.” Read more.

Kevin Kuhlman, Vice President Federal, Government Relations, National Federation of Independent Business: 

“On behalf of the National Federation of Independent Business, the nation’s leading business advocacy organization, thank you for convening a hearing focused on lowering unaffordable healthcare costs and examining transparency and competition in healthcare.” 

[…] 

“NFIB recommends that Congress implement policies that lower healthcare costs for small employers and their employees while expanding choice and flexibility in benefit offerings and reducing regulatory burdens.” Read more.

Cynthia Fisher, Founder and Chairman, Patient Rights Advocates: 

“On behalf of healthcare consumers across America, thank you for your bold leadership and commitment to making healthcare price transparency and its unequivocal enforcement a reality in this country. Unfortunately, our latest compliance report found that only one-quarter of hospitals are fully complying with the Hospital Price Transparency Rule. The remaining hospitals posted incomplete price files that are missing key pricing data, including discounted cash prices and prices by every payer and plan accepted.” Read more.

Sterling N. Ransone, Jr., MD, FAAFP, Board Chair, American Academy of Family Physicians: 

“On behalf of the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP), representing more than 129,600 family physicians and medical students across the country, I write to express our appreciation for the Committee holding today’s hearing on health care costs, titled “Lowering Unaffordable Costs: Examining Transparency and Competition in Health Care.” The AAFP shares your commitment to making health care in the United States more accessible and affordable, and we write to offer our policy recommendations from the family medicine perspective.” Read more.

The American Medical Association: 

“The AMA commends the Subcommittee for focusing on the critically important issue of consolidation in health insurance, hospital, and pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) markets and the consequences for patients.” Read more.

American Benefits Council: 

“The American Benefits Council (“the Council”) thanks you for holding this important hearing, “Lowering Unaffordable Costs: Examining Transparency and Competition in Health Care.” We applaud your focus on examining ideas to drive down the cost of health care through transparency and competition.” Read more.

Cheryl DeMars, CEO, Employers Health Care Alliance Cooperative: 

“The federal transparency efforts of the past several years hold great promise in helping us make rapid progress toward our goals of a truly free market health system informed by objective and reliable price and quality information, and we applaud Congress for its efforts to support this work.” Read more.

National Health Council: 

“Patients are facing rising health insurance premiums, reduced access to care, and record levels of medical debt due to a health care system whose payment and delivery structures too often reward high-cost, low-quality care. Addressing transparency and competition is an important part of helping patients access and afford the care they need.” Read more.

Large Urology Group Practice Association: 

“Chairman Guthrie and Ranking Member Eshoo, the Large Urology Group Practice Association (LUGPA) is honored to submit this testimony to the Energy & Commerce Committee on how to strengthen the health care system. LUGPA represents 150 urology group practices in the United States, with more than 2,100 physicians who, collectively, provide more than one-third of the nation’s urology services. But our focus on public policy is on assisting all independent physician practices and the patients we care for.” Read more.