The Georgia General Assembly is again wrestling with certificate-of-need (CON) legislation. Bills in past years have called for incremental changes in CON, the system that regulates the state’s health care industry, but the latest proposals aim for a major overhaul.
As in past years, hospital groups are generally fighting the proposed changes.
In a new GHN Commentary, Dr. Hal Scherz argues that the current CON laws hurt patients.
“The best way to drive down health care costs is with competition,” says Scherz, founder of Docs 4 Patient Care. CON laws tend to preserve the status quo, block competition and limit patients’ options, he contends.