1. United States
2. Wash.
3. Letter

I am your constituent and I want you to know that Private Equity damages healthcare. They load up on debt, create profit centers, delete or outsource unprofitable functions, create real estate companies to which the hospital must pay rent (often when there was no rent previously). All of this is done to squeeze as much money out of the property as possible. Often, when there is no more money to be had, they declare bankruptcy, leaving communities who need medical care in the lurch. IT is also worth noting that the care they provide is significantly worse than other facilities - up to 25% more accidents and infections. But wait - it gets worse. It turns out that many of these facilities are self insured against liability and malpractice. There is little state oversight of the self insured. In fact, several have gone bankrupt with hundreds of millions of dollars in malpractice claims that will never be paid - because the money is gone. Good news - this is in your hands to fix. I want you to enact the 118th Congress’ Health Over Wealth Act to prevent these facilities from loading up on debt, bleeding institutions dry, cutting staff and harming patients - and apply it to all medical facility acquisitions. Then I want you to pass legislation to force these institutions to have sufficient malpractice reserves available that are not dischargeable in bankruptcy. An alternate is to demand commercial insurance where reserves are actually audited by states. Your constituents need help and this is on your plate to fix. Here is a link to the Health Over Wealth Act for you. Get started https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/senate-bill/4804