The dark side of Medicare Advantage: a must-read investigation

A letter from STAT's Co-Founder and Executive Editor

Log In    Subscribe Dear Readers, If you read anything this year exposing the hidden injustices in our health care system, it should be STAT's new investigative series, Health Care's Colossus.  Our second story, out today, has unsettling implications for millions of patients enrolled in private Medicare Advantage plans. The investigation found that, to squeeze more profits out of unsuspecting patients, UnitedHealth Group, the nation's largest health care company, pressed thousands of its clinicians to use a thinly tested medical device to screen people for artery disease, dramatically boosting government payments. Many of these patients were not even sick.   We have more coverage in the works on how United has transformed itself into a modern-day Standard Oil, exerting unmatched dominance over health care in the United States. This series builds on our run of stories last year on how the company used algorithms to cut off care for seniors — a body of work that has been showered with major national journalism awards.   You can read these exclusive stories and so many more – we often publish a dozen stories a day – if you sign up for our premium subscription, STAT+. Subscriptions enable us to fund all our journalists, including the accomplished and deeply sourced team of reporters behind these stories, Bob Herman, Tara Bannow, Casey Ross, and Lizzy Lawrence.   We are offering a deeply discounted rate for readers THIS WEEK. Subscribe for only $20 for your first 3 months. Special Offer Every day, STAT+ subscribers get stories you can't get anywhere else with tough-minded coverage of the business of making medicines, health tech, science, and public health.   A few recent examples: Health care's 'Pepsi challenge': Doctors' offices are testing AI tools in head-to-head pilots Sarepta demanded Duchenne patient advocacy group censor video critical of the company Tim Walz stood up to corporate health care. Mayo Clinic was a powerful exception What to know about Trump VP pick J.D. Vance's health care views and investments 'Jerking families around': Canceled Roche rare disease trial devastates parents, angers researchers Mount Sinai mounted aggressive campaign to stifle debate over revelations about its controversial brain research This week we also released the fifth annual edition of the STAT Report "Ranking biotech's top venture capital firms," the most comprehensive public examination of how well biotech investors are doing. In an accompanying article, Allison DeAngelis describes the slow pace so far this year and hints of easing pressure. STAT+ subscribers get a special discount to the report.   Thank you for reading STAT, and I do hope you'll take advantage of our special discount subscription rates, which also give you other benefits, like discounts to our events around the country. Please let me know if you have feedback. I'm at rick.berke@statnews.com   Sincerely, Rick Berke Executive Editor & Co-Founder, STAT STAT, 1 Exchange Place, Boston, MA ©2024, All Rights Reserved. I no longer wish to receive STAT emails Update Newsletter Preferences • Contact Us • Advertise with Us