“If you are what you eat, then I only want to eat the good stuff.” No, this is not what President Trump said to newly-confirmed HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. after he signed the “Making America Healthy Again” executive order yesterday. That’s a quote from Remy, the leading character-rat in the Disney-Pixar 2007 film Ratatouille. It is a movie about how even a lowly rat can prove to be the finest chef in Paris. Which is ridiculous, and why it is a comedy. Please read the One Thoughtful Paragraph below to find out other ridiculous things that happened in Paris this week, which are not as funny.
This news isn’t funny and didn’t happen in Paris, but nonetheless are worth a minute of your time:
- SureScripts announced its “Touchless Prior Authorization” tool, which automates prior auth workflows by pulling relevant information from EHRs and sending automatic approvals when appropriate. This launch comes after a successful pilot, showing that denials due to lack of information decreased by 68%, and many approvals were issued within 30 seconds.
- Republicans on the House Energy & Commerce Committee launched a new working group to create a national data privacy standard.
- Cotiviti, a data analytics company backed by KKR, announced it will acquire interoperability platform Edifecs, reportedly for $3B.
“Every second counts, you CANNOT be MOMMY!” While this is a quote from the protagonist (Colette, a French female chef training a novice) in Ratatouille, it was basically the message that Vice President JD Vance brought to the AI Action Summit, held in Paris this week. The AI Action summit is where global leaders, technology executives, and scientists try to agree about how AI may grow and innovate. Instead of agreement, neither the U.S. nor the U.K. signed the international pledge among 70 countries to employ an open, inclusive, and ethical approach to AI’s development. According to Vice President Vance, the U.S. believes that regulation should not behave like an overbearing mommy, but instead “foster the creation of AI rather than strangle it.” This same theme is apparent in a new Paragon Health Institute-published paper, urging the FDA to shift from a pre-market AI review to a post-market surveillance of AI-supported medical devices. It’s like regulating after something already happened – which is how the food critic in Ratatouille threatens restaurants: “I will return tomorrow night with high expectations. Pray you don’t disappoint me.”
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Lastly, a Valentine’s gift from the Maverick team to you: This week, our new team member Perri Cooper shared last week’s newsletter publicly on LinkedIn (here). Please feel free to share with your Valentine, your colleagues, or anyone else you think may find it helpful.
