The Sunlight Foundation has all hands on deck today providing context for today’s bipartisan healthcare summit in real time. Stay tuned all day for updates.

A quick analysis of Center for Responsive Politics data shows that when campaign contributions to the group of roughly 40 party leaders present are tallied, the health professional, insurance, pharmaceutical, hospital and health services/HMO industries all rank within the top 16–meaning those tasked with reforming the industry have also relied upon it more heavily than almost any other to stay in office. (Lobbyists rank 7th.)

Top-contributing industries, 2009-2010Powered by Socrata

Note that while most money attributed to the legal industry, for example, comes from individuals who happen to work for law firms, a much higher proportion for health-related industries comes from political action committees controlled by the corporations and trade groups themselves.