Dr. Oz to AMA: ‘Physicians have lost their mojo,’ can get it back with MAHA

Mehmet Oz, M.D., MBA, administrator of the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), used his appearance before the American Medical Association's (AMA's) House of Delegates to call for stronger physician leadership while outlining the administration's priorities on payment, Medicaid, fraud and prior authorization.

Speaking to delegates on Monday, Oz said the profession has been weighed down by burnout, corporate ownership and layers of bureaucracy — and that the consequences are now visible.

“I believe many physicians have lost their mojo,” he told the room, urging physicians to speak more forcefully when policies threaten patient care or professional autonomy. “Are you willing to do what a scientist should do and push back at orthodoxy?”

Oz used the address to outline the administration’s priorities, including payment adjustments, Medicaid reforms and new agreements with insurers and drugmakers. He pointed to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which includes a 2.5% payment bump for clinicians and additional gains for those in advanced payment models. He said specialists absorbed an “efficiency adjustment” so CMS could “put it into primary care medicine, where I don’t think we pay enough.”

Much of the speech focused on the administration’s stance on Medicaid. Oz argued the program was not designed for “able-bodied individuals” and said the system cannot sustain “20 million people who are sitting at home watching 6.1 hours of television… a day” while enrolled.

Oz described federal and state efforts to determine who is actively seeking work as necessary to stabilize the program and help people “realize that they have agency over their future.”

He drew a similar line on ACA subsidies, warning that pandemic-era expansions have fueled mass mis-enrollment. “Twelve million people last year did not touch their insurance,” he said. “They don’t know they have insurance. They’re wrongly enrolled.”

Oz also highlighted agreements with major drug manufacturers to offer GLP-1 medications at Most Favored Nation–level pricing — a move he said could help justify Medicare and Medicaid coverage while lowering long-term costs related to diabetes and hypertension. “We dropped and pushed prices down,” he said.

On fraud and abuse, Oz adopted an unusually stark tone, calling CMS “a massive hippopotamus with a target on its side” and pointing to international schemes targeting durable medical equipment and skin substitutes. He said the agency has prevented “more than a billion dollars” from leaving the system since he arrived in April 2025.

He reserved one of his clearest pledges for prior authorization, saying insurers representing more than 80% of Americans have agreed to voluntary reforms.

Under the changes, he said, most physicians should receive real-time determinations by the end of next year. He pointed to “gold card” programs — which waive prior authorization for clinicians with consistent practice patterns — as a model that works.

Oz closed by appealing to physicians directly, saying the system relies on their willingness to speak plainly and lead.

“We have to have doctors be brave enough and curious enough and courageous enough to lead us forward,” he said.