MW Trump unveils his 'Great Healthcare Plan.' Analysts don't expect much of an impact.
By Jaimy Lee and Victor Reklaitis
'The policies either stand little chance of being enacted by the current Congress or will have a minimal impact if enacted,' according to one analyst
President Donald Trump, shown here in the Oval Office during an event last month, called on Congress Thursday to pass his "Great Healthcare Plan" without delay so that there's "immediate relief" for Americans.
The Trump administration on Thursday rolled out what it's calling the "Great Healthcare Plan," saying its elements include funding for health savings accounts and a call for Congress to write into law the pricing deals that President Trump has made with drugmakers.
Analysts didn't sound impressed with the effort.
"We think it is intended to demonstrate that the White House is doing 'something' about affordability and healthcare prices, but we believe the policies either stand little chance of being enacted by the current Congress or will have a minimal impact if enacted," said Spencer Perlman, director of healthcare research at analysis and forecasting firm Veda Partners, in a note.
Other parts of the healthcare plan include transparency initiatives, such as making providers and insurers prominently post their prices, along with a call for Congress to fund what's known as cost-sharing reduction payments.
"Their ideas are nothing new, nothing unexpected, pretty challenging to implement," said Kim Monk, a healthcare policy analyst at Capital Alpha Partners. "I'm not seeing anything earth-changing."
Similarly, Raymond James analyst Chris Meekins said the plan unveiled on Thursday is "a retread of previously advocated-for positions and there is no legislative path forward for much of it, in our view."
Trump and other administration officials, on the other hand, were upbeat about their plan.
"Instead just papering over the problems, we have gotten into this 'Great Healthcare Plan' a framework that we believe will help Congress create legislation that will address the challenges," said Dr. Mehmet Oz, Trump's administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, during a call with reporters.
In a video focused on the plan, Trump said he's "calling on Congress to pass this framework into law without delay," saying lawmakers "have to do it right now so that we can get immediate relief to the American people."
Thursday is also the last day to enroll in an Obamacare health-insurance plan, and there is widespread worry about the number of Americans who may be forced to go without health insurance due to soaring prices. The costs of premiums and deductibles for those plans are significantly higher since the enhanced subsidies that made them cheaper expired last year. Some experts believe that the costs of ACA plans will be a sticking point in this fall's midterm elections.
Drugmakers that have made pricing deals with the administration were trading lower on Thursday. Shares of companies like Eli Lilly $(LLY)$ and Novo Nordisk (NVO) started to slide at the market's open - likely due a Reuters report on delays for drugs that had been promised a speedier review process by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Most pharmaceutical stocks PJP were down in recent trading, with Lilly and Novo both off about 4%, while AstraZeneca $(AZN)$ was shedding 2%.
Health insurers and hospital companies rallied after Trump's announcement. Oscar Health's stock $(OSCR)$ was up around 7%, while shares of Centene $(CNC)$ and Molina Healthcare (MOH) gained about 2%. All three of those companies are highly exposed to the Obamacare marketplace for health insurance. Shares of Tenet Healthcare $(THC)$ and Community Health Systems (CYH) were both up about 4%.
-Jaimy Lee -Victor Reklaitis
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January 15, 2026 15:10 ET (20:10 GMT)
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