SAN FRANCISCO 鈥 There鈥檚 so much money floating around here this week, you can almost see it wafting through the air.
About 10,000 attendees, mostly confident men in well-cut suits and even nicer watches, are packing the elegant Westin St. Francis Hotel for the invite-only , which ends Thursday.
For many of these investors, health providers, insurers and entrepreneurs at the nation鈥檚 largest and most prestigious health investment conference, it鈥檚 all about the deal 鈥 and the after-hours parties.
In the first few days of what鈥檚 become known as J.P. Morgan Week, New Jersey-based Celgene it would spend up to $7 billion to acquire Impact Biomedicines. And Novo Nordisk, the world鈥檚 biggest insulin maker, $3.1 billion for a Belgian biotech firm.
For those who didn鈥檛 land a coveted invite, satellite conferences on digital health and biotechnology , offering lesser mortals an opportunity to network and make their own deals. Former Vice President Joe Biden even popped into town to the StartUp Health Festival satellite conference, speaking about cancer treatment costs and electronic health records.
The J.P. Morgan gathering comes at a jarring time when you consider that the other world of health care is flooded with uncertainty for the millions of ordinary Americans who inhabit it. They face a precarious political landscape in which the future of the Affordable Care Act remains uncertain and Republican leaders in Congress mull dramatic cuts to Medicaid and Medicare.
John Baackes, CEO of the nation鈥檚 largest public health plan, L.A. Care, which insures 2.1 million low-income patients, said if his enrollees wandered into the conference, 鈥渢hey鈥檇 think they were in a foreign land and that this has nothing to do with them.鈥
Much of U.S. health care is underwritten by public dollars, but people here didn鈥檛 come to talk about that or rising costs, particularly for prescription drugs. Only a few presentations at this year鈥檚 conference have touched on prices, including a J.P. Morgan released Monday that found many Americans put off medical care until they get their tax refund 鈥 a clear sign that that they don鈥檛 have enough saved up to pay for care when they need it.
鈥淚t鈥檚 just so striking how much maneuvering and desire there is at this meeting for a piece of the spent on health care,鈥 mused Dr. Vivian Lee, the former leader of the University of Utah Health Care system, who made a point of tracking costs with pinpoint precision. 鈥淚s anyone here trying to decrease their share?鈥
Baackes, who comes to the conference to network and monitor the latest developments in health care, said he鈥檚 always skeptical of the well-heeled company officials who attend promising better health outcomes and cost savings. 鈥淚n a way, there鈥檚 too much money walking around here,鈥 he said. 鈥淚nvestors are thinking, 鈥楬ealth care is a $3 trillion sector of the economy; surely it will benefit from my genius.鈥欌
Many attendees view the conference with a less critical eye.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a useful place for us to be,鈥 said Amanda Cowley, strategy director of the quasi-governmental organization that produces the U.S. Pharmacopeia, a compendium of information and standards for producing medicines and food ingredients. Cowley said she and her colleagues need to learn about emerging health technologies so they can anticipate their future work products.
Cowley stood in a line of hundreds of attendees waiting to dine on tri-tip, vegetables and macarons while listening to Microsoft founder Bill Gates talk about how his foundation is helping improve the health of subsistence farmers and children in the developing world.
But there was little talk of America鈥檚 subsistence patients, who often cannot afford the expensive drugs and medical devices that are bought and sold in deals brokered at conferences like these, in private rooms guarded by phalanxes of staffers at tony hotels.
Those patients, however, were the focus of a Medicaid panel held Tuesday at Glide Memorial Church in San Francisco鈥檚 troubled Tenderloin district, a few blocks and a world away from the Westin St. Francis. That event, which drew about 70 people, was sponsored by ConsejoSano, a Southern California-based startup that has raised $7.2 million to help Spanish speakers better navigate the health system.
Rallying the troops at Glide was former Medicare and Medicaid chief Andy Slavitt, a fierce critic of Republican efforts to repeal and replace the ACA. Slavitt recently invested in Cityblock Health, a focusing on Medicaid and other low-income patients.
The good thing about J.P. Morgan Week, Slavitt told Kaiser Health News, is that it draws innovative people who want to invest. 鈥淭he question is, should health care capital be focused on solving big problems and getting rewarded for them, or just focused on the status quo?鈥
This story was produced by聽, which publishes聽, an editorially independent service of the聽.
