UnitedHealth uses AI model with 90% error rate to deny care, lawsuit alleges (Ars Technica)
BY BETH MOLE
For the largest health insurer in the US, AI’s error rate is like a feature, not a bug.
The lawsuit accuses UnitedHealth and NaviHealth of breach of contract, breach of good faith and fair dealing, unjust enrichment, and insurance law violations in many states. It calls for actual damages, damages from emotional distress, disgorgement and/or resititution, and an end to the AI-based claims denials.
It’s unclear how much UnitedHealth saves by using nH Predict, but Stat estimated it to be hundreds of millions of dollars annually. In 2022, UnitedHealth Group’s CEO made $20.9 million in total compensation. Four other top executives made between about $10 and $16 million each.
Who profits most from America’s baffling health-care system? (The Economist)
BY Mariano Pascual
HINT: it isn’t big pharma
Over the past decade these firms have quietly increased their presence in America’s vast health-care industry (see chart ). They do not make drugs and have not, until recently, treated patients. They are the intermediaries—insurers, chemists, drug distributors and pharmacy-benefit managers (PBMs)—sitting between patients and their treatments. In 2022 the combined revenue of the nine biggest middlemen—call them big health—equated to nearly 45% of America’s health-care bill, up from 25% in 2013. Big health accounts for eight of the top 25 companies by revenue in the S&P 500 index of America’s leading stocks, compared with four for big tech and none for big pharma.
She Trusted Her First OB-GYN Because He Spoke Spanish. Now She’s 1 of 94 Women Suing Him for Sexual Assault. (ProPublica)
BY Adriana Gallardo, ProPublica, and Jessica Miller, The Salt Lake Tribune
The Utah Supreme Court this week is hearing arguments in the case, which will determine if what 94 women say they experienced was sexual assault or medical malpractice.
“At every single appointment, over the course of a number of years and pregnancies,” the lawsuit states, “Broadbent would have [Carmela] undress and would feel her breasts and look into her vagina, occasionally inserting his fingers into her vagina. Then, when Broadbent went to perform a pap smear, he inserted a speculum, took a sample, and then inserted four fingers inside her, causing discomfort and bleeding. He then inserted his middle finger in [Carmela’s] rectum with a lot of force and would insert it repeatedly for a few minutes, causing bleeding and sensitivity.”
FDA considers ban on some Black women’s hair products that have caused years of harm (ABC News)
BY MARY KEKATOS
Many products targeted towards Black women contain cancer-causing chemicals.
“There’s a whole history of hair and hair care in the Black community, and some of it stems from issues of racism and discrimination against how women wear their hair and what’s considered a professional hairstyle in office settings, for example, or in school,” Dr. Kimberly Bertrand, an associate professor of medicine at Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine, told ABC News.
“So, there’s lots of reasons women may have used chemical hair relaxers, historically and even currently, everything stemming from the social pressures to have their hair look a certain way smooth and sleek,” she continued. “Some women find that their hair is just easier to manage when it’s relaxed and then of course there’s individual style and fads and trends, and how people want to wear their hair.”
Sexism in healthcare is causing women to die from cancer, say researchers (The Telegraph)
BY LAURA DONNELLY
The Lancet found that focus on ‘women’s cancers’ is leading to neglect of treatments for other forms of disease
The analysis says that “unconscious gender bias” and discrimination means that women are too often receiving “sub-optimal care”, with major cancers being missed.
Researchers said that a focus on reproductive and maternal health, and on “women’s cancers” – such as breast and cervical cancer – too often meant prevention and treatment of other types of cancer was neglected. Two thirds of deaths from cancer in patients below the age of 50 are those of women, researchers said, with many dying “in the prime of their life”.
The report said that too little focus was given to alerting women to the risk factors for cancer. It cited a study that found only 19 per cent of women who attended a breast cancer screening knew that alcohol was a major risk factor.
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