Chicago-based Hillrom faces antitrust lawsuit over hospital bed sales
A Chicago-based medical technology company recently purchased by health care giant Baxter is facing an antitrust lawsuit brought by a rival that alleges it has a “stranglehold” on the hospital bed market.
In the federal lawsuit filed Tuesday in Chicago, hospital bed-maker Linet alleges Hillrom, the main provider of hospital beds in the U.S., used “anti-competitive” practices to slow Linet’s growth in the U.S. market, including “coercing” hospital administrators into locking entire health systems into long-term agreements.
Hillrom, which the lawsuit calls a “serial abuser of antitrust laws,” makes up at least 70% of standard, intensive care and birthing beds installed in U.S. hospitals, according to the complaint.
“As COVID-19 cases and new variants continue to spread across the country, hospitals are overwhelmed and, in some areas, lack the beds necessary to treat critically ill patients, thereby creating an unprecedented spike in demand for the resources needed to save patients’ lives,” Linet Americas, a U.S.-based part of European company Linet Group, alleges in the lawsuit. “In the middle of this public health crisis stands Hillrom, the dominant supplier of hospital beds in the U.S.”
Read more: https://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-hospital-bed-antitrust-lawsuit-hillrom-linet-20211230-yxrcgy6birdrle3ogff7fchuju-story.html