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The Danger of No Antitrust Enforcement: How a Merger Led to the US Ventilator Shortage

By  |  April 30, 2020

Matt Stoller (ProMarket)

The New York Times had an important story about the ventilator market a few days ago, with Nicholas Kulish, Sarah Kliff, and Jessica Silver-Greenberg reporting why a government effort to stock up on the machines after the SARS epidemic failed.

In 2006, in attempt to learn from what might happen should a SARS-like disease hit here, civil servants in government decided to stockpile ventilators.

They wanted both more ventilators and better ventilators than were on the market. So government officials found a small innovative corporation called Newport Medical and contracted with the corporation to design a cheaper and better version.

Ventilators at the time typically went for about $10,000 each, and getting the price down to $3,000 would be tough. But Newport’s executives bet they would be able to make up for any losses by selling the ventilators around the world…

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