This is what is just one of many things wrong with having large for-profit corporations to be handling the administration of Medicare. They are part of the problem of fraud, waste, and abuse…NOT the solution.
When a large corporation, owns several pieces of the supply chain, both acting as the insurer but also owning hospital facilities, labs, and urgent care centers, these same health insurance corporations can push providers to have procedures done in day a costly surgical hospital, even though the procedure would normally be done as a simple outpatient with local anesthetic. The difference between the two can be from $18,000 to just $3,000, for just this one example in the article. But I have read about much worse examples than even this with disparaging costs on the hundreds of thousands.
Please feel free to read either article, which are the same but in case you trust one news source over the other I am supplying both.
https://kffhealthnews.org/news/vertical-integration-high-health-costs-prices-hospital-mergers-pharmacies-pbms/
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/vertical-integration-healthcare-higher-patient-bills/