The NYC Health Department, where I previously served as commissioner, has an annual budget of about $2 billion. The city’s annual contribution to NYC Health Hospitals, the public healthcare system that serves more than 1 million New Yorkers a year, is also about $2 billion. Yet the city’s single biggest health line item dwarfs both of those budgets combined: NYC spends more than $8 billion a year on employee and retiree health benefits.

Are our teachers, nurses, firefighters, and sanitation workers getting the care they need and deserve? Are we as a city getting our money’s worth?

The city took an important step in addressing costs in January, transitioning to a self-insured structure for health benefits, eliminating the role of a large corporation previously serving as middleman. But the city can do more to improve healthcare access and squeeze out waste, particularly when it comes to prescription medicines.

The NYC Employees PPO........

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