I have seen lots of these odd ads about “surprise medical billing” on TV.   I couldn’t figure out the angle and couldn’t find the source of the ads.  Seems a private equity firm invested in a company that farms our ER docs wants to be able to charge, well, whatever they want.  Basically a huge media effort to allow a financial firm to screw sick Americans.

Yesterday this came out. In an exceedingly rare show of bipartisanship, everyone agreed that this was wrong, and for a brief moment it looked like our elected officials would do  the right thing and protect American consumers from the worst sorts of predators.  Alas, it was not to be.  From Common Dreams:

Top Dem Accused of Putting Private Equity Before Sick and Poor by Killing Effort to End ‘Devastating’ Surprise Medical Bills

One critic said Rep. Richard Neal, the Democratic chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, is “actively helping private equity-owned doctor groups rip off and destroy the lives of people at their most vulnerable.”