Nun, Done, and Uninsured: Katy Talento

Nun, Done, and Uninsured: Katy Talento

From Out of Patients with Matthew Zachary by Matthew Zachary Worldwide

May 12, 2026 · 46 min · Episode 443

About this episode

Katy Talento discusses her journey from Capitol Hill to healthcare reform and critiques the complexities of the healthcare system.

In 2008, Katy Talento walked away from Capitol Hill and into a Catholic convent. Within a year, she walked out. Within another decade, she sat inside the White House shaping health policy. Somewhere in between, she got labeled “infertile” after a single cycle of testing and spent years believing it. That label stuck. The pain that came before it never got investigated. Doctors offered birth control and moved on. No one asked why her body was struggling. No one followed the thread. Talento built her career inside the very systems she now critiques. She worked on federal health policy, global disease programs, and later advised the Trump administration on healthcare reform. She helped advance price transparency rules in a system where hospitals can still list 457 different prices for the same service. Then she left. Now she builds employer health plans that bypass insurers, PBMs, and traditional networks. Her approach replaces insurance contracts with direct payment, nurse navigators, and cost sharing models that promise simplicity but raise hard questions about risk and protection. This conversation sits in that tension. Talento describes a healthcare system shaped by layered…

People in this episode

Host: Matthew Zachary

Guest: Katy Talento

Topics covered

  • health policy
  • healthcare reform
  • insurance
  • employer health plans
  • patient care
  • cost transparency

Keywords

  • health policy
  • insurance
  • employer health plans
  • cost sharing
  • price transparency
  • healthcare reform

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Trump administration, Capitol Hill, White House

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