Code Blue: Inside America''s Medical Industrial Complex

A powerful and path-breaking expose of Americas Medical Industrial Complexthe network of mutually beneficial relationships between big business, academic medicine, patient advocacy organizations, hospitals, and governmentand a compelling way forward for transforming Americas healthcare system

How has the United States, with more resources than any nation, developed a healthcare system that delivers much poorer results, at near double the cost of any other developed countrysuch that legendary seer Warren Buffett calls the Medical Industrial Complex the tapeworm of American economic competitiveness? Mike Magee, M.D., who worked for years inside the Medical Industrial Complex administering a hospital and then as a senior executive at the giant pharmaceutical company Pfizer, has spent the last decade deconstructing the complex, often shocking rise of, and connectivity between, the pillars of our health systemBig Pharma, insurance companies, hospitals, the American Medical Association, and anyone affiliated with them. With an eye first and foremost on the bottom line rather than on the nation's health, each sector has for decades embraced cure over care, aiming to conquer disease rather than concentrate on the cultural and social factors that determine health. This decision Magee calls the original sin of our health system.

Code Blue is a riveting, character-driven narrative that draws back the curtain on the giant industry that consumes one out of every five American dollars. Making clear for the first time the mechanisms, greed, and collusion by which our medical system was built over the last eight decadesand arguing persuasively and urgently for the necessity of a single-payer, multi-plan insurance arena of the kind enjoyed by every other major developed nationMike Magee gives us invaluable perspective and inspiration by which we can, indeed, reshape the future.