The "free market" and health "insurance" come from mutually contradictory philosophical backgrounds. Health Insurance originally evolved because of Government manipulation of market forces, and "health insurance" is one of the primary causes of why medical care costs are so excessive
It has effectively removed the supply and demand paradigm from the process. When people aren't paying their own bills, they have no interest in controlling costs. When they are paying their bills, they object to excessive or extravagant costs, and it is this pressure that keeps prices down in other industries.
In the medical fields, the only ones in which costs are decreasing are those for elective procedures, such as eye surgery or cosmetic procedures.
In all other areas (where insurance dominates) prices are out of control and excessive.
“Health Insurance originally evolved because of Government manipulation of market forces”
Actually, the health insurance problems started with companies hiring the MBA types in the 1950’s. Back then many companies offered private stock in the company so many professionals found about 30% of their income was derived in stock (or profit sharing). As a professional employees gained tenure their incomes became more and more profit sharing based; a true employee.
Companies found they could cut those costs by offering perhaps more salary and less promises of profit sharing to the younger new hires. That turned into less stock for more tenured employees too. That turned into a need to find other compensation mechanisms.
Healthcare was expensive at the time, so a group policy would save the group money, and if the employer paid some of it, that became a cost multiplier; meaning, an employee might have paid $50/month for insurance but using this employer compensated group plan they paid $15/month, giving them a perceived value of $35/month.
That turned into mandated insurance, which gave insurance companies the green light to go nuts since they now had a captive audience.
That gave the government a green light since so much money was out there and everyone in government wants their hand in it. Money = power.
Only 60 years later and the entire system has been perverted to the point of becoming useless.