The trick is in how you define "the better". Problem is that hospitals don't buy just syringes, they buy lots of medical supplies at once, and corporations can offer much better deals on such orders, you can just buy everything at once. They then use that position to push exclusive deals with hospitals and kill the small players. It is still a free market at work, hospital gets the best deal business-wise, but it has retrograde effects on the progress and end-users.