Health Care
Daryl James and Renée Flaherty | 10.29.2024 10:25 AM
Getting a medical appointment can take weeks or months in the United States, where big hospitals dominate local markets. Independent eye doctor Jay Singleton is trying to break up such a cartel in North Carolina, where he operates.
Singleton's case is urgent, but he has been stuck on a different type of waiting list for years. Instead of health care access, he's been fighting for court access. He had good news this month when the North Carolina Supreme Court revived his lawsuit against the state regulators who function as gatekeepers for the entire industry.
Certificate of need (CON) laws exist in various forms in 38 states and Washington, D.C. The stated goal of such laws is to keep costs down by preventing overinvestment in any single market. If regulators decide an area already has enough of any type of service, they can block new construction.
As a result, nobody in........