Non-public fairness (PE)-acquired opioid therapy applications (OTPs) within the US, 2011–22. Credit score: Well being Affairs (2025). DOI: 10.1377/hlthaff.2025.00326
The acquisition of opioid therapy applications by personal fairness traders is a rising nationwide development, prompting questions in regards to the potential to develop entry to methadone, a medicine that may reduce the danger for overdose deaths by greater than half. Opioid therapy applications are at the moment the one settings with the authorized authority to dispense methadone for the therapy of opioid use issues.
However in a brand new examine revealed in Well being Affairs, researchers discovered that whereas personal fairness acquisition of opioid therapy applications consolidates possession amongst monetary traders, it does not change the methadone provide, enhance therapy entry or lower opioid-related deaths.
Most consultants agree that rising entry to methadone is a crucial coverage aim for addressing the opioid disaster within the U.S., mentioned lead examine creator Yashaswini Singh, an assistant professor on the Brown College College of Public Well being.
“If treatment was expanded under private equity ownership, you would expect to see an increase in methadone shipments, openings of new facilities and a corresponding decrease in opioid-related deaths, and we found none of that,” Singh mentioned. “Our findings suggest that we ought to pay more attention to what role investors serve in opioid treatment programs if they’re not expanding access and not delivering any tangible public health gains.”
Singh is a well being care economist whose analysis focuses on well being care consolidation and corporatization. She mentioned the examine was impressed by conversations between state and federal policymakers with Singh and fellow researchers at Brown’s Heart for Advancing Well being Coverage by means of Analysis in regards to the impacts of the development of for-profit possession of methadone clinics.
Discovering the precise knowledge posed some challenges, Singh mentioned, as there aren’t any reporting or disclosure necessities for personal fairness investments. In collaboration with researchers from the College of Pittsburgh and the RAND Company, the staff used strategies resembling algorithmic matching, geocoding and the guide verification of acquisition offers to establish which corporations acquired which services, and when. To measure methadone entry, they checked out methadone shipments to opioid therapy applications.
The researchers recognized 357 private-equity acquired opioid therapy applications in 43 states between 2011 and 2022. Throughout this time, the variety of applications within the U.S. with any degree of personal fairness funding elevated from simply 0.26% to 18.9%. The overwhelming majority of the applications have been acquired by certainly one of three giant personal equity-backed platforms, the researchers discovered.
Change in common annual methadone shipments to opioid therapy applications (OTPs) after personal fairness (PE) acquisition, relative to matched controls, 2006–19. Credit score: Well being Affairs (2025). DOI: 10.1377/hlthaff.2025.00326
One sample the staff noticed was that whereas personal fairness investments in different well being care segments are typically extra frequent in city areas in populated states resembling Florida, the states with the very best ranges of personal fairness funding in opioid therapy applications tended to be these which have been disproportionately affected by the opioid epidemic, resembling Tennessee, Ohio and Kentucky.
The researchers discovered that after personal fairness acquisition, methadone shipments to opioid therapy applications elevated by 13% relative to people who hadn’t been acquired, however this was not statistically vital after the researchers adjusted for different components—for instance, this system might have already been increasing, making it a extra enticing goal for traders. County-level methadone shipments and opioid mortality remained unchanged after acquisition.
The findings ought to spark further scrutiny of the influence of personal fairness funding on entry to therapy for opioid use issues, Singh mentioned.
“When you pair our finding that private equity firms have acquired over two-thirds of the opioid treatment market with the finding that private equity acquisition didn’t improve treatment access, I think it raises concerns about what purpose, and whose interests, these investments are actually serving,” Singh mentioned.
Extra data:
Yashaswini Singh et al, Non-public Fairness Buying Massive Shares Of The Opioid Therapy Market With out Altering Market-Stage Methadone Provide, Well being Affairs (2025). DOI: 10.1377/hlthaff.2025.00326
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