BREAKING: Hospital Mega-Merger Concluded in New York City

According to a report in The New York Times online that appeared in the evening of July 16, “Two major New York City hospital networks have agreed to merge, creating the largest private hospital system in the city, raising the prospect of higher prices for consumers, and positioning the new system to take advantage of coming changes under the federal healthcare law.” As the Times article by Anemona Hartocollis reported, “The boards of the two hospital systems, Mount Sinai Medical Center and Continuum Health Partners, a network of community-oriented hospitals that includes Beth Israel and the two St. Luke’s-Roosevelt campuses, approved the merger in consecutive votes on Monday and Tuesday. The decision,” the report added, “came after a year of courtship and after Mount Sinai, with a last-minute offer, scuttled a deal between Continuum and a competitor, NYU Langone Medical Center, that would have threatened its position.”