Changes from Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” took effect, ending special federal financial incentives for the 40 states that expanded Medicaid under the ACA. The Congressional Budget Office projected these cuts would leave 1.3 million more Americans uninsured in 2026, primarily …
Four House Republicans—Brian Fitzpatrick (PA), Mike Lawler (NY), Rob Bresnahan (PA), and Ryan Mackenzie (PA)—signed onto a Democratic-led discharge petition on December 17, 2025, bringing the total to 218 signatures and forcing a vote on extending Affordable Care Act subsidies for three years. The …
The Department of Veterans Affairs plans to eliminate as many as 35,000 healthcare positions, mostly unfilled jobs including doctors, nurses, and support staff, according to internal memos obtained by the Washington Post. The cuts would reduce VA healthcare workforce to as few as 372,000 employees—a …
President Trump signed an executive order on September 30, 2025, titled ‘Unlocking Cures for Pediatric Cancer with Artificial Intelligence,’ committing an additional $50 million to explore AI applications in pediatric cancer research. The order directs the MAHA Commission to coordinate …
On September 26, 2025, Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform led a coalition of 35 conservative organizations—including Club for Growth and Americans for Prosperity—in sending a letter to President Trump urging him to let enhanced Affordable Care Act (ACA) tax credits expire in December …
On July 24, 2025, UnitedHealth Group confirmed in an SEC filing that the Department of Justice has launched both criminal and civil investigations into the company’s Medicare Advantage billing practices, focusing on systematic upcoding fraud that may have generated billions in government …
After a record-breaking vote-a-rama with the most amendment votes in Senate history, the Senate passed Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” 51-50 with Vice President Vance casting the tie-breaking vote.
The Congressional Budget Office confirmed the bill cuts over $1 trillion from …
On May 1, 2025, the Department of Justice filed a False Claims Act lawsuit against three of the nation’s largest health insurance companies—Aetna (CVS Health), Humana, and Elevance Health (formerly Anthem)—along with three major insurance brokers—eHealth, GoHealth, and SelectQuote. The …
In 2024, the healthcare sector spent $743.9 million on federal lobbying—$10 million less than 2023’s $745 million but maintaining its position as the largest lobbying sector in the United States for the 26th consecutive year. Pharmaceutical and health products companies led healthcare spending …
On December 4, 2024, Brian Thompson, CEO of UnitedHealthcare, was shot and killed outside the New York Hilton Midtown in Manhattan. The assassination, allegedly carried out by 26-year-old Luigi Mangione, exposed widespread public anger at the American health insurance industry’s systematic …
On October 31, 2024, the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General (OIG) released a report estimating that Medicare Advantage insurers received at least $7.5 billion in improper payments in 2023 from Health Risk Assessments (HRAs) that added diagnoses to inflate risk scores …
The Federal Trade Commission filed an administrative antitrust complaint against the three largest pharmacy benefit managers—CVS Caremark, Express Scripts (Cigna), and OptumRx (UnitedHealth)—and their affiliated group purchasing organizations, charging them with anticompetitive and unfair practices …
On August 16, 2024, Humana agreed to pay $90 million to settle the first whistleblower lawsuit alleging systematic fraud in Medicare Part D prescription drug program bidding. The case exposed how Humana maintained “two sets of books”—submitting false financial projections to the Centers …
The House Committee on Oversight and Accountability held a hearing with executives from the three largest PBMs—Adam Kautzner (Express Scripts), David Joyner (CVS Caremark), and Patrick Conway (OptumRx)—presenting findings from a comprehensive 32-month investigation. Chairman James Comer released a …
DaVita Inc. agrees to pay $34,487,390 to resolve False Claims Act allegations involving three distinct kickback schemes: paying a competitor to induce referrals to DaVita Rx pharmacy subsidiary in exchange for acquiring European dialysis clinics and extending dialysis product purchases; providing …
The Federal Trade Commission released its interim staff report titled ‘Pharmacy Benefit Managers: The Powerful Middlemen Inflating Drug Costs and Squeezing Main Street Pharmacies,’ revealing alarming market concentration and anticompetitive practices. The report found that three PBMs—CVS …
Steward Health Care, the Dallas-based for-profit hospital system operating 31 hospitals across eight states, declared bankruptcy in one of the most colossal failures of a hospital chain in American history. Private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management and former CEO Ralph de la Torre reportedly …
On February 27, 2024, the Wall Street Journal reported that the Department of Justice launched a major antitrust investigation into UnitedHealth Group, focusing on whether the company’s vertical integration strategy—particularly Optum’s acquisition of physician practices—creates …
On November 14, 2023, the families of two deceased Medicare Advantage beneficiaries filed a federal class action lawsuit alleging that UnitedHealth Group knowingly uses a faulty artificial intelligence algorithm with a 90% error rate to systematically deny elderly patients coverage for medically …
The Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee held a historic hearing bringing together CEOs of major insulin manufacturers (Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk, Sanofi) and executives from the three largest PBMs (CVS Caremark, Express Scripts, OptumRx) to examine soaring insulin prices. …
On March 13, 2023, ProPublica published an investigation revealing that health insurance giant Cigna used an automated system called PXDX to deny 300,000 claims over two months without doctors examining individual patient files—spending an average of just 1.2 seconds reviewing each case before …
U.S. District Judge Edward Davila sentences Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes to 135 months (11 years, 3 months) in federal prison plus three years supervised release for defrauding investors of over $140 million. Holmes is ordered to surrender on April 27, 2023 to begin serving her sentence. …
The Federal Trade Commission ordered private equity firm JAB Consumer Partners to divest veterinary clinics in four metropolitan areas as a condition of its $1.65 billion acquisition of Ethos Veterinary Health, citing concerns about JAB’s roll-up strategy creating local monopolies in specialty …
The Federal Trade Commission unanimously voted to authorize a comprehensive investigation into pharmacy benefit manager business practices under Section 6(b) of the FTC Act, with all five commissioners voting in favor. The FTC issued compulsory orders to the six largest PBMs—CVS Caremark, Express …
A federal jury convicts Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes on one count of conspiracy to commit investor fraud and three counts of wire fraud involving over $140 million in investments. The conviction follows a nearly four-month trial where prosecutors presented testimony from 29 witnesses …
In December 2021, researchers at Harvard Medical School published a landmark study in Annals of Internal Medicine demonstrating that hospitals acquired by private equity firms experienced significant increases in emergency department mortality—7 additional deaths per 10,000 visits (approximately 10% …
In November 2021, Pfizer reported annual profits of $21.98 billion on revenues of $81.29 billion for 2021, with COVID-19 vaccine sales of $36.7 billion accounting for 45% of total company revenue. The COVID-19 vaccine became one of the most financially successful pharmaceutical products in history, …
Genesis Healthcare, once the largest skilled nursing operator in the United States, narrowly avoids bankruptcy by accepting a $100 million investment from Joel Landau’s private equity firm ReGen Healthcare LLC, which receives 93% equity stake and two board seats in exchange. Genesis’ …
On December 27, 2020, Congress passed the No Surprises Act as part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021, banning most surprise medical billing beginning January 1, 2022. The legislation addressed a predatory billing practice that generated billions in profits for private equity-backed …
National Bureau of Economic Research releases landmark study (Working Paper 28474) analyzing patient-level Medicare data from 18,000 nursing facilities over 17 years, finding that private equity ownership increases patient mortality by 10% compared to other nursing homes. The 10% mortality increase …
President Trump tested positive for COVID-19 on October 2, 2020, and was flown by Marine One helicopter to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center that evening, where he received an experimental monoclonal antibody cocktail developed by Regeneron Pharmaceuticals under “compassionate …
In June 2020, NPR analysis revealed that the federal government had awarded over 250 COVID-19 related contracts worth more than $1 million each without full competitive bidding, totaling billions of dollars in federal spending. Many contracts went to companies with no experience in medical …
AbbVie completed its $63 billion acquisition of Allergan after FTC approval requiring divestiture of digestive drug brazikumab to resolve antitrust concerns. The merger created a pharmaceutical giant with combined 2019 revenues of $48 billion and a diversified portfolio spanning immunology, …
One day before trial, California hospital system Sutter Health agreed to pay $575 million and change anticompetitive practices after a lawsuit filed by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra and consolidated with a 2014 case brought by the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union. …
AbbVie reached settlement agreements with eight biosimilar manufacturers that allowed immediate biosimilar competition in Europe starting October 16, 2018, but delayed all US market entry until 2023—seven years after Humira’s original patent expired in December 2016. The settlements ended …
The Department of Justice approved Cigna’s $52 billion acquisition of Express Scripts, one of the three largest pharmacy benefit managers, completing the deal announced in March 2018. Assistant Attorney General Makan Delrahim stated that after a six-month investigation reviewing over two …
The Trump administration finalized regulations expanding short-term, limited-duration health insurance plans from a maximum 3-month term (set by Obama in 2016) to 364 days with renewability up to 3 years total. These plans—derided by critics as ‘junk insurance’ and ’the Trump …
On July 13, 2018, the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General released a report finding that former HHS Secretary Tom Price violated federal travel regulations on 20 of 21 trips reviewed, wasting at least $341,000 in taxpayer funds through improper use of chartered …
Twenty Republican state attorneys general and governors, led by Texas, filed Texas v. Azar (later California v. Texas) in federal district court, arguing that the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act’s zeroing of the individual mandate penalty rendered the entire Affordable Care Act unconstitutional. The …
On January 24, 2018, the Senate confirmed Alex Azar as Secretary of Health and Human Services by a vote of 55-43, installing as the nation’s top healthcare regulator a pharmaceutical executive who had overseen dramatic insulin price increases during his decade at Eli Lilly. As President of …
CVS Health announced its $69 billion acquisition of health insurer Aetna (with debt, $77 billion total), marking the largest healthcare merger in U.S. history and accelerating vertical integration in pharmacy benefit management. Under the deal, Aetna shareholders would receive $145 in cash plus …
Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price resigned after revelations he spent over $1 million in taxpayer funds on private jets and military aircraft for travel that included personal business. Price took at least 26 private charter flights costing over $400,000, often to places where he had …
In January 2017, diabetes patients filed a federal antitrust class action lawsuit alleging that the three pharmaceutical manufacturers controlling 99% of the U.S. insulin market—Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk, and Sanofi—conspired to raise insulin prices in near-lockstep coordination, increasing prices by …
On August 31, 2016, Rep. Tom Price (R-GA), chairman of the House Budget Committee and member of the Ways and Means Health Subcommittee, purchased between $50,001 and $100,000 in discounted shares of Innate Immunotherapeutics, an Australian biotech company, through a private placement offering …
In August 2016, Mylan CEO Heather Bresch faced intense scrutiny when it was revealed that EpiPen prices had increased from approximately $103 in 2007 to over $608 by 2016—a nearly 550% price increase for a life-saving allergy treatment. The scandal exposed pharmaceutical price gouging, the failure …
At approximately 3:45 PM on August 15, 2016, a Saudi-led coalition airstrike struck the Abs Hospital in Yemen’s Hajjah governorate, killing at least 11 people including an MSF staff member and injuring at least 19 others. The hospital was clearly marked as a medical facility and Médecins Sans …
Walgreens formally terminates its partnership with Theranos after discovering that 31,000 Walgreens customers had received voided test results from the blood-testing company’s faulty devices. The termination follows months of deteriorating relations after the October 2015 Wall Street Journal …
In 2016, a whistleblower who had worked for 12 years at the American Kidney Fund filed a lawsuit alleging that dialysis giants DaVita and Fresenius Medical Care—which together control over 80 percent of the $24.7 billion U.S. dialysis market—operated a years-long kickback scheme where they donated …
Johns Hopkins researchers published findings demonstrating that pharmaceutical companies were systematically gaming the 1983 Orphan Drug Act by obtaining orphan drug designations—intended for treatments of rare diseases affecting fewer than 200,000 Americans—for blockbuster drugs generating billions …
Valeant Pharmaceuticals’ October 2015 disclosure of its relationship with specialty pharmacy Philidor Rx Services triggered the unraveling of a systematic drug price gouging scheme that had raised prices on dozens of medications by 50-3000% over two years. Under CEO Michael Pearson, Valeant …