Drug Middlemen You've Never Heard Of Control Everything, Family Coverage Costs More Than a Car, and Court Says EHRs Can't CAPTCHA Their Way Out of Data Sharing

Drug Middlemen You've Never Heard Of Control Everything, Family Coverage Costs More Than a Car, and Court Says EHRs Can't CAPTCHA Their Way Out of Data Sharing

Hey all,

Happy Monday! Consolidation is proceeding exactly as planned, which is to say unchecked and increasingly expensive. Pharmaceutical wholesalers now control 98% of the market while expanding into medical practice ownership, employer health premiums continue their steady climb past $27,000 for family coverage, and EHR vendors are deploying CAPTCHAs to keep your own data hostage. Apparently the invisible hand of the free market works best when it's forming a monopoly and picking your pocket.

Enjoy The Rundown 

Jacob Brody Co-Founder & CEO ZorroRX

(NEJM) Pharmaceutical Wholesalers — Under-the-Radar Middlemen? 

A surge in vertical integration by pharmaceutical wholesalers like McKesson, Cardinal Health, and Cencora—who now control 98% of the market—has drawn concern for potentially raising costs and undermining clinical autonomy despite claims of improving efficiency. These wholesalers are expanding beyond distribution into ownership of medical practices and specialty networks through management-services organizations (MSOs), consolidating power across the drug supply chain and raising antitrust and legal red flags. But hey, if we’ve learned anything from health insurance companies, vertical integration always leads to stellar patient care and rock-bottom prices. Full Article

(KFF) and (2025 Employer Health Benefits Survey): 

The 2025 KFF Employer Health Benefits Survey finds that average annual premiums for employer-sponsored health insurance rose to $9,325 for single coverage and $26,993 for family coverage, a 5–6% increase over the previous year. While these increases are in line with recent wage and inflation trends, many employers report significant cost pressures—especially from high-demand drugs like GLP-1 agonists for weight loss—and are exploring strategies like raising cost sharing or limiting coverage. Frankly, with costs climbing like this and so many benefit vendors driving prices up behind the scenes, you'd think benefits buyers would be re-evaluating their entire stack—not calmly sipping coffee while the CFO stares over their shoulder wondering who to fire first. Full Article

(Health API Guy) Real Time Medical Systems v. PointClickCare Case

The ongoing Real Time Medical Systems v. PointClickCare litigation marks healthcare’s first major judicial test of the 21st Century Cures Act’s information blocking rules, centering on whether EHR vendors can restrict robotic process automation (RPA) and screen scraping by third-party apps. After PointClickCare’s CAPTCHAs blocked Real Time’s automated data access, courts ruled such barriers likely constitute unlawful information blocking, affirming that Cures Act violations can serve as predicates for state unfair competition claims—thus enabling private enforcement. And honestly, when an EHR insists on keeping your data locked inside their system, it’s usually because they know if you could leave, you would at the first sign of a competent competitor. Full Article