Who Broke the Healthcare System?

At MedCity News’ Bullseye event, Editor-in-Chief Arundhati Parmar asked two nonprofit health-plan CEOs a direct question: Who broke the healthcare system?

Sachin Jain, CEO of SCAN Health Plan, accepted shared responsibility among healthcare leaders, arguing that the industry has normalised practices it would reject in personal care decisions. Ascendiun CEO Paul Markovich similarly highlighted the influence health plans have over payment rules, administrative burden, and digital infrastructure.

The discussion also questioned whether corporate behaviour is determined solely by ownership structure or short-term financial incentives. As Jain noted, corporations are not inherently good or bad, and should not be reduced to shareholder interests alone. His broader point: healthcare, as an industry dealing directly with human life, must be governed as a moral enterprise, not just a financial one.

This was a leadership discussion, not a study. It does not assign blame to any single actor or model. Its value lies in the accountability question it raises: systemic reform is difficult when participants attribute failures to “the system” while treating their own decisions as fixed.