The purpose of this commentary is to describe how regulations for the accountability of accountable care organizations (ACOs) could reduce patients' risks of receiving care that is unsafe and of inferior quality by addressing more explicitly their human rights. I supplement, not criticize, the evidence and arguments in the articles in this special issue. The authors of most of them allude to issues pertinent to patients' human rights, especially to measuring and improving quality. In discussing alternative regulatory strategies, however, the authors focus almost exclusively on addressing problems of competition, market entry, and pricing.
This commentary is grounded in the history of the politics of policymaking for health over much of the past century. An aspect of this history that is central to my argument is the formulation and implementation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which has been ratified by many countries since 1948. According to the Universal...
