A Federal Trade Commission hearing involving a Chicago area hospital merger may be a sign that the government may take a less sympathetic view of healthcare industry mergers in the future. So far the Bush administration has taken a far sterner line against hospital mergers than many observers would have predicted, the Chicago Tribune reports. The FTC is challenging the 2000 merger of Evanston Northwestern Healthcare and Highland Park Hospital. FTC lawyers say that following the merger, Evanston Northwestern raised prices by as much as 40 percent.
The Tribune notes that "the case is considered a landmark of sorts for federal antitrust lawyers, who are renewing an aggressive stance toward hospital mergers. Throughout the 1990s the FTC and the Justice Department lost a combined seven cases challenging hospital mergers."
- see this story from the Chicago Tribune