I am curious to hear thoughts on if PE should be restricted from certain sectors/industries, especially when it comes to people’s health. The journal JAMA recently published a study that found rates of hospital-acquired complications increased by 25% at hospitals after they were purchased by private equity firms. In addition to hospitals, PEs are acquiring nursing homes, behavioral health systems, and private physician practices. If you consider a typical PE model where they acquire a company, then look to reduce costs (perhaps by switching higher paid positions to lower paid positions) and lean down operations, and then increase billing in order to increase profits, then what might be the impact be to healthcare costs, impact to tax payers and to patients overall health?
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/26/health/private-equity-hospitals-riskier-health-care/index.html#:~:text=Listen-,Private%20equity%20ownership%20of%20hospitals%20made%20care,patients%2C%20a%20new%20study%20finds&text=The%20rates%20of%20hospital%2Dacquired,firms%2C%20a%20new%20study%20says.