It depends

Depending on who you ask, profit is good and bad. If you're the one who has to shell out an enormous amount of money to purchase health insurance, your first thought it that you're spending too much. However, if you're a company trying to sell a product, profit is a good thing.

I read an interesting article that talked about the implications of rising healthcare costs on health insurance companies, rather than on individuals. It talks about a never-ending "positive feedback" loop where companies hike up prices, healthy individuals can no longer afford to pay high premiums and drop out, and companies hike up prices again due to loss of money on the remaining sick population. http://trueslant.com/rickungar/2010/02/16/private-health-insurance-industry-in-‘death-spiral’/