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Abstract

Because joint purchasing arrangements are a central feature in current health care reform efforts, it is fitting that one of the Symposium's panel discussions focuses on them. Professor Havighurst raises the antitrust issues presented by group-purchasing arrangements, emphasizing the need for careful evaluation of buyers market power in order to ensure that such collaborations do not have anticompetitive effects. His conclusion that "[e]mployer coalitions or cooperatives engaged in the joint purchasing of health care can plausibly promise to achieve efficiencies" is borne out by the fact that a variety of private activities are currently under way to achieve those efficiencies. I will discuss some of these private activities and the legislative proposals they have spawned. In addition, I will describe various proposals to immunize collaborative purchasers from the antitrust laws and the legal and policy problems they present.

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