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Golf tournament to benefit Helping Hands Society

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Letter to the Editor: ‘Hops & Grapes Fest’ gave lift to White Haven Area Community Library

<p>We applaud the Federal Trade Commission for doing what is right for Americans, and for challenging the U.S. District Court&#8217;s ruling that would have allowed the merger of Penn State Hershey Medical Center and Pinnacle Health System in Harrisburg.</p><p>What judges such as U.S. District Judge John Jones need to realize is that the consolidation of health-care systems hurts everyone &#8211; except for the hospital executives who profit from these mergers.</p><p>Regardless of what these health systems promise, no study ever has shown that consolidation lowers health-care costs. In fact, the opposite is true.</p><p>Thus, the FTC correctly argues that the merger would lead to higher prices and poorer quality.</p><p>Just because the government has &#8220;created a climate that virtually compels institutions to seek alliances such as the hospitals intended here,&#8221; as Jones wrote in his opinion, doesn&#8217;t mean Americans should rubber-stamp moves that will continue to cause our health-care costs to skyrocket.</p><p>The FTC appeal has put this merger on ice while the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit considers whether to bless or block the consolidation.</p><p>In making its decision, I hope the appeals court takes a good look at the Idaho case, in which last year the U.S. Appeals Court for the Ninth District upheld a lower court&#8217;s decision that a major Idaho health system had to unwind its acquisition of a large medical practice because it would harm the community.</p><p>The Association of Independent Doctors, a national trade association for which I serve as executive director, wrote an amicus brief for that case, asking the court to do what it did and send a loud message to other health systems looking to merge and form monopolies.</p><p>We hope clear minds also prevail in the Pennsylvania decision &#8211; and then again in Chicago, where the merger between NorthShore University and Advocate Health Care also is being challenged in federal court &#8211; and everywhere else in the country where mergers are harming communities and driving up costs.</p><p>The FTC is our best hope.</p><p><strong>Marni Jameson Carey</strong></p><p>Executive director</p><p>Association of Independent Doctors</p><p>Winter Park, Fla.</p><style>
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Letter to the Editor: Health-care system consolidation is bad prescription for Pennsylvania