BACKLASH AGAINST HMOS

DOCTORS, PATIENTS, UNIONS, LEGISLATORS ARE FED UP AND SAY THEY WON'T TAKE IT ANYMORE

America's health-insurance revolution has reached adolescence. After more than a decade, managed-care plans--with their incentives for doctors to hold down treatment costs--cover about half the population. Fee-for-service plans--with their equally problematic incentives for doctors to provide too much costly treatment--continue to shrink. The result has been a welcome reduction in the runaway growth of medical costs and, for many people, simpler, better coverage of their real needs. But as in any adolescence, there are signs of rebellion. An ominous backlash has begun.

By now, nearly anybody who has come into contact with the system can recite a litany of horror stories:...

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