Airlift Competition

The NY Times ran an interesting article (link) today on the proliferation of medical airlifts across the country. The article is instructive in several ways, especially because it highlights the dynamic often at work in a competitive medical system.
When a new airlift company would move into an area the number of calls any one operator received would drop, because the overall call volume remained about the same. The same pie was being divided into a greater number of pieces. As a result, each helicopter company raised its prices. Prices went up for everyone.
The general rise in prices was not the only thing that happened, as companies were only drawn to places where there was a high proportion of insured patients who could pay for the services. Patients without insurance still did not get the services they needed. It’s a phenomena we’ve seen in many areas of healthcare—everyone rushes to help the patients who have insurance, and leaves those without it in the cold.