Over the past 50 years, most states enacted (and many still retain) Certificate of Need (CON) laws, whose stated purpose is to control medical costs by limiting the supply of services and facilities to only what is “needed,” as determined by a state board or agency. Simply put, CON laws make it illegal for healthcare providers to offer services to patients, or to purchase certain medical equipment, without first getting permission from those providers already operating in the market. That permission is often denied—not because of any threat to public health, but solely to prevent legitimate economic competition.
Soon after the federal government encouraged states to adopt such laws in the 1970s, it became clear that this cost control experiment was a failure. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice, and several academic studies found that by eliminating competition, CON laws actually drove up costs, lowered quality, and limited the availability of needed services. As the American Medical Association succinctly put it: “CON laws represent a failed public policy.”
Yet 38 states still have CON laws on their books, and continue to require government approval before building or expanding a healthcare facility or service—approval that can hinge on whether existing hospitals are willing to allow others to enter the market to compete against them.1 This is primarily because existing providers benefit handsomely from CON laws, which allow them to block would-be competitors. Given the monopoly profits that CON laws enable incumbent providers to realize, these firms invest time and resources in preserving the anti-competitive power that these laws give them. As a result, most efforts to repeal CON laws have been unsuccessful in recent years.
https://rtp.fedsoc.org/paper/competitors-veto-state-certificate-of-need-laws-violate-state-prohibitions-on-monopolies/Exhaustive article.
F these piece of crap providers for preventing competition. It's your job to treat your patients, not to use govt dictate to prevent competitors.
