It looks like Walmart wants to be in the
healthcare business. NPR reports that Walmart "wants to dominate a growing part of the healthcare market, offering a range of medical services from basic prevention to management of chronic conditions like diabetes and heart disease". Remember, it started with little quick care clinics and now they want to do chronic disease management. Weird, huh? I wonder if it is going to work.? Walmart is good at what they do. They sell cheap wares because they squeeze suppliers with bulk purchasing. How that carries over to healthcare is beyond me but if anyone can pull it off it would be them. It is reported that they intend to build a national, integrated, low-cost primary care healthcare platform and become the largest provider of primary healthcare services in the nation. In a shopping store? One can imagine the payer mix of their customers! Something tells me this could be Walmart's Netflix moment. Or, better yet, Walmart's Waterloo.
Interestingly enough, Walmart has backed off and are now denying they want to dominate the healthcare system and the information put out by NPR was "overwritten and incorrect". Not buying it.
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Squeezing suppliers with bulk purchasing ? When it's good ol' Medicare, it's referred to as compassionate for our deserving seniors, even as they drive the primary care docs to the margin.
Let us not forget the huge reduction and elimination of healthcare benefits for Wal-Mart employees.
Working both ends of the industry?
Yesterday's statement from Wal-Mart's Dr. John Agwunobi, head of health and wellness, did say what the company doesn't want to do: "We are not building a national, integrated, low-cost primary care health care platform."
When has Wal-mart not done something Low-cost and nationally integrated?
Truly a Qwikster moment.
Let them try. I would love to see them go down in flames. They were a big part of the destruction of our nations manufacturing base. I guess that they want to try to destroy medicine as well. I haven't stepped foot in one of their crummy stores in years.
My guess is that they won't accept people without some form of payment.
Me neither. When the only health care available is a mid-level at Walmart their work (and that of the nursing lobbies) will be complete at last.
One of the bigger problems with this is that if it happens, the website "People of WalMart" might become a HIPPA violation!!!
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