Amazon is looking to bring telehealth and in-person care to 20 more cities. Where and when will this expansion take place? I’m Jeff Lagasse with Healthcare Finance News, and we’ll answer that question and hopefully more in this week’s Top Stories.
Amazon Care is reportedly looking to launch its app-based home visits in 20 major U.S. cities through 2022, starting with Philadeplhia, Chicago, Dallas and Boston this year, with 16 more to follow in 2022. As we see in HealthcareITNews, (https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/amazon-looks-bring-telehealth-person-care-20-more-cities), Amazon Care has grown rapidly since it was first offered exclusively to the tech giant's Seattle-based employees in 2019. This past September, Amazon announced it would allow employees to access the app-based care throughout Washington state. It then made services available to other employers in the state before officially expanding its telehealth option to employers in all 50 states this summer. But its in-person services, which include follow-up blood draws and exams, have been limited so far to users in D.C. and Baltimore, as well as in Washington state.
Cityblock Health, a primary care startup that targets the Medicaid and low-income Medicare populations, has raised $400 million in funding, bringing the company’s valuation to $5.7 billion. MobiHealthNews reports (https://www.mobihealthnews.com/news/cityblock-rakes-400m-platform-focused-medicaid-and-low-income-populations-and-other-digital) that Cityblock will use the funds to reach more people, with the company saying it wants to serve 10 million members by 2030, necessitating the need to scale its operations, technology and care services. The company is a spin-off of Alphabet subsidiary Sidewalk Labs, founded in 2017, and focuses primarily on health equity.
Finally this week, AHIP is concerned about the timeline for an interim final rule on surprise billing, and has asked the Department of Health and Human Services and other agencies for safe harbor for insurers to implement provisions in the rule through 2023, rather than the scheduled start date of 2022. According to Healthcare Finance News (https://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/ahip-wants-more-time-insurers-implement-interim-final-rule-surprise-billing), the law requires consumers to be protected from receiving surprise medical bills beginning on January 1, 2022. The concern is that health plans may not have enough lead time to implement some of the new regulations.
I’m Jeff Lagasse with Healthcare Finance News, and this has been Top Stories.