Searchlight Institute: Health Care Must Serve Patients, Not Corporations. May 26, 2026. Too often, the deck is stacked against patients and individual health care providers trying to do the right thing for the patients, because corporations dominate the health care marketplace and put profits first. Costs rise, care is denied, and patients are too often treated as commodities or profit centers rather than people. Health Care. Such monopolies also allow companies to continue offering consumers poor products. Health care is frequently a consumer hassle, involving long wait times, inefficient and archaic consumer interactions, and often deliberate barriers to care. Receiving health care is never likely to be something people look forward to — but it should not be the ordeal of denied care and unfair practices it has too often become in America. To make sure health care serves patients, not corporations, we propose the following reforms that will also lower costs:
- Ending the power of insurance monopolies to stack the deck against patients
- Preventing corporate hospital systems from using monopoly power to drive up costs for patients
- Unleashing the creative power of American innovation to make health care more responsive and consumer-friendly
A charter of consumer rights to make sure insurance companies treat patients fairly – Insurance should be a conduit to good health care, not a barrier, but insurance companies often place barriers between patients and the care they need by using denials of coverage systematically as a way to boost profits, particularly for low-income beneficiaries who are less likely to appeal — a practice that one expert has called “rationing by inconvenience.” The ever-expanding use of AI threatens to automate these denials to robot efficiency and scale…”
See also Center for American Progress, April 7, 2026. A Patients’ Bill of Rights To Lower Health Care Costs. CAP’s plan would deliver immediate relief on premiums, deductibles, and insurance denials.
