In October 2026, CVS Health described a five-store Michigan pharmacist pilot, according to Reuters’ report of 23 October. The initiative remains an experiment; the report did not establish employer-plan savings or a nationwide rollout. Evaluate the complete employee journey Benefits purchasers should request a precise service specification before considering participation. It should identify the tasks performed, the professionals responsible, eligibility and any employee charge. The proposal should also show

In October 2026, Transamerica published its healthcare retirement-plan research with a release datelined 15 October, identifying immediate financial pressures alongside long-term retirement needs. Further coverage appeared on 19 October. The distinction matters: this is an October publication reporting earlier fieldwork, not a new survey of employees conducted during that later news cycle. For benefits teams, its practical value lies in coordinating support that employees can use alongside retirement planning.

Management of Health Care Facilities and Patient Attendance during Major Disruptions: Evidence from Kenya, NBER Working Paper 35223, links a management survey with administrative data. The May 2026 study covers 429 primary healthcare facilities and 73 hospitals and examines outpatient attendance during disruption that included COVID-19 and a public health workers’ strike. The authors report that attendance fell overall. Private facilities experienced a smaller decline than public facilities, consistent

Blackwell Captive Solutions announced on 20 April 2026 that it is developing a homogeneous group medical stop-loss captive for cannabis operators and growers. The proposed pool is restricted to that sector and is intended to offer an alternative to traditional fully insured employee health plans. The company describes planned availability in 24 states plus Washington, DC, where medical and recreational cannabis use are permitted, and another 16 states permitting

The OECD’s Driving Down the Colorectal Cancer Burden: Detect, Diagnose, Deliver, published on 20 April 2026, examines detection, diagnosis and treatment. The brief highlights delays and inequalities in access. Its focus invites benefits teams to consider the whole care pathway rather than treating coverage of a screening service as the end of their review. An employer health plan cannot determine clinical eligibility or replace national recommendations. It can make

WellGuard Assurance announced on 15 April 2026 that Ron Rowe had been appointed chief executive officer. The company describes itself as a Tennessee captive-insurance organisation within the VerraCare healthcare ecosystem, working with Detego Health as its third-party administrator. Its stated aim is to give employers greater control, transparency and stability in managing healthcare costs. The company-issued announcement highlights the needs of smaller and medium-sized employers. It is evidence of

KFF’s release dated 29 January 2026 reports that 32% of US adults were very worried about affording healthcare, above the other household expense categories tested. It also reports that 56% expected healthcare costs for their families to become less affordable. The January tracking poll covered 1,426 adults surveyed from 13 to 20 January, with a full-sample margin of error of plus or minus three percentage points. Its population was

In May 2024, South Africa’s Presidency confirmed the signing of the National Health Insurance Bill into law. The signing remarks explicitly described implementation as phased, with systems and governance arrangements still to be established. For employer health programmes, this historical milestone should be read as an enacted reform with an implementation process. It did not establish overnight operational coverage or automatically answer what every employer should do with its

MAXIS Global Benefits Network (MAXIS GBN) in June 2022 announced its partnership with HUMANOO, a Berlin, Germany-based provider of automated digital wellbeing solutions. MAXIS’ multinational clients will now be able to choose to work with HUMANOO and help improve the overall health, wellbeing and engagement of their people. According to the company, “HUMANOO’s app is designed to help improve employees’ physical and mental health with customised, on-demand fitness, physio,

In May 2022, McKinsey published an analysis of employers’ health benefit priorities based on a September 2021 survey of 1,640 employers. The findings described intentions to expand benefits while managing medical costs. They do not establish that adding a specialist provider produces better care or lower expenditure. For benefits buyers, the useful next step is to define the problem a proposed vendor would be responsible for solving. Start with

Healthcare joint venture Haven, created by Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase to address the rising cost of employee healthcare in the United States, was dissolved in April 2021 after three years of operations. The Boston-based organization informed employees that it will cease activities by the end of next month. Many of Haven’s 57 staff members are expected to transition to roles within the three founding companies, which will

The pandemic continues to pose huge challenges to health services worldwide. Hospitals are in crisis as the pace of new COVID-19 cases outstrips their capacity. What makes things particularly difficult is that the coronavirus doesn’t affect everyone in the same way.

New federal regulations finalized Nov. 15 require hospitals to make public all the prices they negotiate with insurers and health plans, starting in 2021. The aim is to untangle the hospital marketplace with a wave of consumer-friendly information that will promote competition that leads to lower costs. Hospitals are not happy, but advocates of well-informed, patient-centered health care should be cheering.

Hong Kong-listed Ping An Good Doctor (PAGD), along with the Hurun Research Institute, in early 2019 released a “Good Doctors Guide” covering both traditional Chinese medicine and Western medicine to “help 1.4 billion people find the doctors they need”. In 2019, Good Doctor intended to develop its Hospital Cloud, Clinic Cloud, Pharmacy Cloud, Village Medical Cloud and increase the pace of its international strategy. According to Wang Tao, chairman

Ping An Good Doctor Develops Commercial Operation of One-Minute-Clinics in China Ping An Good Doctor (PAGD), China’s largest online healthcare services provider and a spin-off of Chinese insurer Ping An, in 2019 expanded its AI-based “One-Minute Clinics” across eight Chinese provinces and cities. One-Minute Clinics are small rooms where patients enter to connect with a virtual doctor (the “AI Doctor”) which in a few minutes offers a preliminary diagnosis

Medical robots are helping doctors and other professionals save time, lower costs and shorten patient recovery times, but patients may not be ready. Our research into human perceptions of automated health care finds that people are wary of getting their health care from an automated system, but that they can adjust to the idea – especially if it saves them money.

Fitbit in February 2019 launched a new fitness tracker, the Inspire, which is available through health and wellness providers only. From a consumer perspective, the Inspire is a fully subsidized (i.e. free) product intended to be distributed in mass quantities and is promoted “as a way to encourage the well-being of health care recipients”. The tracker monitor activity and sleep, calories burned, and prompts wearers with reminders to get

InsurTech Oscar Health in February 2019 named Sid Sankaran CFO, reporting to CEO Mario Schlosser. He succeeds Brian West. Sankaran joins from American International Group (AIG) where he was CFO and earlier, chief risk officer. Prior to AIG, he worked for consulting firm Oliver Wyman as a partner in the Finance and Risk practice in Toronto, Canada; and Mercer Risk, Finance & Insurance Consulting and MMC Enterprise Risk. He

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in November 2018 released the 2018 edition of Health at a Glance: Europe. This report is led by the European Commission and designed to assist member states in improving the health of their citizens and the performance of their health systems. The report cites “two overarching trends [that] warrant special mention”: [T]he steady increase in life expectancy has slowed considerably in

Cigna in September 2018 announced the launch of Cigna Ventures, a corporate venture fund focused on transformative and innovative healthcare companies. Cigna has committed $250 million of capital to help it find, assess and sponsor early-stage innovation ideas that call for deeper exploration through pilots and test-and-learn activities. The $250 million will be used to invest in startups and growth-stage companies across three strategic areas: insights and analytics; digital

The fledgling Berkshire Hathaway, Amazon and JPMorgan Chase health care company for employees in September 2018 appointed Jack Stoddard as chief operating officer. Stoddard joins the company from media firm Comcast, where he was General Manager of the Digital Health division; and previously, Chief Operating Officer and Chief Strategy Officer of Comcast Ventures’ investee Accolade, a health technology and services company providing health navigation and care coordination to consumers.

The new health care venture formed by Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase announced June 20 that Harvard professor and well-known author Atul Gawande would be the company’s CEO. The idea for the new company is to innovate by cutting costs from the health care system, starting with the more than 1 million employees of the three companies behind the venture.

Poor quality health services are holding back progress on improving health in countries at all income levels, according to Delivering Quality Health Services – a Global Imperative for Universal Health Coverage, a joint report published in July 2018 by the OECD, World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Bank. Factors that hinder progress include inaccurate diagnoses, medication errors, inappropriate or unnecessary treatments, inadequate or unsafe clinical facilities or practices,

A new OECD Health Statistics 2018 report, released in June 2018, shows that health spending in 2016 grew by its fastest rate in seven years, with further growth expected in 2017. OECD countries spending on health care increased by 3.4% on average in 2016, its highest rate since 2009. That percentage is still below pre-global financial crisis levels, when average health expenditures rose by around 4-6% per year (in

AIA Singapore and Medix in May 2018 announced an exclusive partnership to offer Personal Medical Case Management Services (PMCM) to AIA customers. The service is said to be the first of its kind in Singapore and will help customers facing serious medical conditions by making sure they get the right diagnosis as fast as possible, have access to optimal treatment, and are supported through their treatment journey until recovery.

U.S. surgeon general Jerome Adams in April 2018 urged employers to help in fighting the opioid epidemic. He was speaking at a conference sponsored by the National Business Group on Health (NBGH), an association of large employers. Adams estimates that 2.1 million people in the U.S. are struggling with an opioid-use condition. While these drugs can be helpful for a short time, they pose serious addiction risks. Common opioids include

Efforts to increase workforce productivity have focused on upgraded technology, process improvement and better governance. A white paper released in March 2018 by Morneau Shepell suggests that it is now time to tackle the most complex element of improving workforce productivity: ensuring commitments to total health from employers and employees. Total Health: the last piece of the workforce productivity puzzle, by Dr. Bill Howatt, explains that workforce productivity, or