Tony Lima
September 10, 2010

The New York Times (September 9, 2010, p. B10) ran a Q and A with Jonathan Bush, CEO of Athenahealth.  Should be required reading for everyone.  A few samples:

“Based in Watertown, Mass., Athenahealth offers a suite of administrative services for medical practices. It collects payments from insurers and patients, and it manages electronic health records and patient communication systems. All of this is done remotely through the Internet — or “in the cloud,” as Mr. Bush puts it. Doctors don’t have to install or manage software or pay licensing fees; instead, Athenahealth keeps a percentage of the revenue.”

“In fact, when we were trying to raise venture capital to go do more birthing centers, and it wasn’t happening, one of the venture capitalists said in passing that he would give me $11 million for an unlimited license to Athenanet [laughs]. And I think our pre-money valuation for the whole company was $7 million. It was as if a budding, small airline wakes up to find that they invented the Sabre system.”

“Q. What do you think will happen to the total cost of health care under reform?

A. Oh, it’s going to go through the roof! It’s widely accepted that this is not a cost-reform bill — it’s an access bill. It’s in fact a cost-expansion bill.”

Isn’t this the Bush that should have been president?