Ken Braun: Michigan's Certificate of Need helps hospitals, hurts patients

Ken Braun: Michigan's Certificate of Need helps hospitals, hurts patients | MLive.com:
"But in Michigan, we have the Certificate of Need Commission.
The job of this powerful but obscure bit of meddling is to determine how much medicine is too much medicine.
On its website, the Michigan Department of Community Health says the CON program balances “cost, quality and access issues, and ensures that only needed services are developed in Michigan.”
In plain-English, this means even highly-qualified medical providers must beg for permission before adding hospital services ranging from MRI scanners and transplant surgery, down to just basic hospital beds.
If the CON Commission thinks too many hospital beds or MRIs exist already, it will say “no.”