Possibly bogus prediction contest

The Heritage Provider Network (whoever they are) has announced a $3 million prize “to develop a breakthrough algorithm that uses available patient data, including health records and claims data, to predict and prevent unnecessary hospitalizations.”  They claim that they want this to benefit individual patients, but it seems to me that the most obvious use is to deny insurance or charge very high prices to those most at risk of hospitalization.

I don’t believe that data are really available to allow high enough accuracy in prediction to benefit any individual (what do you do if your risk of hospitalization is twice normal?), but there is plenty of data to assess higher insurance rates or deny insurance to people because they have a somewhat higher chance of filing claims.

Quite frankly, I’m convinced that this is a morally bankrupt contest, and I want no part of it. If we had a system of health care that was not dominated by for-profit insurance companies, I would have fewer concerns about the ethics of this prize competition.