Rethinking Access to Care
Rethinking Access to Care explores how structural assumptions, technology, policy, and pricing shape who actually receives healthcare — and who doesn’t. From the hidden biases embedded in the system to the promise and limits of AI at the bedside, these Talks examine the forces redefining access in America. Together, they challenge us to look beyond coverage and ask a more urgent question: how do we build a system that works for the people it was designed to serve?
Explore the Talks:
- Jonathan Gruber explains the economic mechanics behind the Affordable Care Act and what they teach us about the future of healthcare reform.
- Peter Bach argues that drug prices are artificially inflated in the U.S. and outlines a more rational, transparent model that protects both access and innovation.
- Suchi Saria demonstrates how bedside AI can deliver real-time early warnings to clinicians — if health systems modernize the data infrastructure needed to support it.
- Mitchell H. Katz reveals how U.S. healthcare is built on assumptions that exclude low-income patients — and argues for redesigning care around the realities of people’s lives.
What’s next for healthcare reform
Jonathan Gruber
Health Systems Architect Jonathan Gruber provides a detailed and emotional perspective evaluating the implications of health insurance on economic mobility and preventative care. As the premier architect of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, he offers a detailed account of risk, cost, and economic efficiency in our approach to health insurance.
In his TEDMED Talk, Jonathan highlights that critical components of the Affordable Care Act: “non-discrimination regulations, an individual mandate, and low income subsidies” were also the basis of Massachusetts’ first-in-the nation universal health care coverage plan. Drawing insights from his first hand experience designing healthcare to fit our times, Jon shares his thoughts on the road ahead in his TEDMED 2020 Talk, “What’s next for healthcare reform.”
More About This TalkAbout Jonathan Gruber
About Jonathan
Jonathan Gruber is a leading health economist and a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he holds the title of Ford Professor of Economics. He is also a key figure at the National Bureau of Economic Research, where he directs the Health Care Program. Throughout his career, Jonathan has focused on the economics of health care and has been a major player in shaping health care policy. He is widely known for his role as a technical consultant during the development of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as Obamacare, under the Obama Administration. He was also a chief architect of Massachusetts’ health care reform, which was later used as a model for the ACA. His extensive research combines economics, policy, and health care to understand how these systems work. For his contributions, he was recognized as the best health economist in the nation under 40, receiving the American Society of Health Economists Inaugural Medal in 2006. Jonathan has also been consistently listed by Modern Healthcare Magazine as one of the most powerful people in American health care.
