US company in takeover of network of GP practices
FEBRUARY 4, 2021

Operose Health Ltd, the UK arm of the large US healthcare insurance provider Centene Corporation, is to take over AT Medics, one of the leading providers of primary care services in London. The Lowdown understands that the details of the change of ownership will be presented to all PCCCs (Primary Care Commissioning Committees) across London over the next week.

AT Medics operates 49 GP surgeries across London, providing services to around 370,000 people, with 900 employees, which until the takeover was owned by six GP directors.

Its new owner, Operose Health was formed in January 2020, when Centene Corporation brought together its subsidiaries in the UK – The Practice Group (TPG) and Simplify Health. The Practice Group, which had a number of GP surgery contracts, was acquired by Centene in 2017. Operose’s direct parent company in the UK is MH Services International (UK) Ltd.

https://lowdownnhs.info/news/us-takeover-of-a-network-of-gp-practices/
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Under cover of covid…
BY MARTIN SHELLEY
FEBRUARY 21, 2021

Privatisation and marketisation through competitive tendering and outsourcing have been ongoing in the NHS and the public health sector for decades, much to the benefit of corporate interests profiting from the slow ‘drip drip’ dismantling of the health service.

As revealed in The Great NHS Heist documentary, the Conservative Party was ‘wargaming’ its plans for selling off the NHS and other public utilities as long ago as 1977, planning denationalisation “not… by frontal attack, but by a policy of preparation for return to the private sector by stealth”. Campaigning group WeOwnIt has also noted a 1988 pamphlet from the Tory-linked Centre for Policy Studies thinktank which suggested how profitable the NHS would be for the private sector.

https://lowdownnhs.info/analysis/privatisation-in-the-nhs-during-the-pandemic-covid/