The $54 billion marriage between health insurance behemoths Anthem and Cigna is still off after a federal appeals court denied Anthem’s efforts to overturn a previous court order blocking the mega-merger. [More]
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Anthem Responds To Cigna’s Lawsuit With A Suit Of Its Own
By 2.15.17
There are bad breakups, and then there are breakups that involve both sides suing each other at the same time: A day after Cigna announced it would officially give up on its proposed merger with Anthem and filed a lawsuit claiming billions of dollars in damages, Anthem has turned around and filed its own lawsuit in response. [More]
Cigna Officially Gives Up On Merger With Anthem, Sues Anthem For $13 Billion Instead
By 2.14.17
After more than a year of review and another six months in court, only to lose, it looks like health insurer Anthem’s plan to buy rival Cigna is truly dead in the water. Cigna announced today that it’s terminating the agreement to merge, but this breakup is far from mutual. Instead of simply going off their separate ways, Cigna is now suing Anthem, seeking billions in damages. [More]
Federal Judge Blocks $54 Billion Anthem/Cigna Merger
By 2.9.17
Only a few weeks after a federal court blocked the insurance mega-merger of Aetna and Humana, it’s happened again: Last night, a U.S. District Court judge rejected the $54 billion marriage of health insurance giants Anthem and Cigna. [More]
Justice Dept & 9 States Officially File To Block Anthem/Cigna, Aetna/Humana Mergers
By 7.21.16
The rumor mill yesterday has been borne out today, as the Department of Justice has officially filed a pair of lawsuits to block the mega-mergers of health insurers Anthem and Cigna. [More]
Report: Justice Dep’t Ready To Block Both Anthem/Cigna And Aetna/Humana Mergers
By 7.19.16
We closed out 2015 with the health insurance market poised to get a lot smaller, as Anthem proposed to by Cigna and Aetna said it would buy Humana. If both mergers go through, the number of large nationwide health insurance carriers would drop to just three… a big challenge in a U.S. that’s seen the market for health insurance expand since the Affordable Care Act went into effect. And if reports are true, the Justice Department may feel that’s just too much contraction. [More]
How Does JetBlue’s New Employee College Tuition Program Compare To Others?
By 4.18.16
Just like a 401k, health insurance, and other benefits, more and more companies are offering to pay for employees’ college education — or at least part of it — as a way to keep them on the payroll. Joining the increasingly growing list that includes Pizza Hut, Starbucks, Anthem Insurance, and Fiat Chrysler, JetBlue announced today that it would offer crewmembers a program to obtain a college degree. [More]
Anthem Buying Cigna For $54B In Yet Another Mega Insurance Merger
By 7.24.15
What a difference a month makes: Just a few weeks ago, Cigna rejected Anthem as a suitor, citing things like the major data breach the company suffered earlier this year and turning down its $47 billion merger bid. It seems Anthem has been busy a-courtin’, as the company announced this morning that it’s reached a deal to buy Cigna for $54 billion, effectively creating an insurance giant. [More]
Cigna Rejects Anthem’s $47B Merger Bid, Says It’s “Deeply Disappointed” By Suitor’s Recent Actions
By 6.22.15
After Anthem Inc. unveiled its roughly $47 billion bid to merge with fellow health insurer Cigna Corp. over the weekend, the object of its affections swiftly put the kibosh on that proposal. In a letter to Anthem’s board, Cigna said it was “deeply disappointed” with its suitors recent actions, and that the offer wasn’t in the best interest of shareholders. [More]
Anthem Hack Included Personal Information For 78.8 Million Customers & Employees
By 2.25.15
Nearly three weeks removed from the detection of a massive data breach, health insurer Anthem Inc. is releasing more details about the scope of the hack, including the fact that personal information for about 78.8 million was compromised. [More]
Anthem Says Data From As Far Back As 2004 Exposed During Hack, Offering Free Identity Theft Protection
By 2.13.15
A week after health insurer Anthem announced that it was the latest victim of a security breach, the company revealed that hackers had access to tens of millions of customers’ data going back as far as 2004. [More]
“Tens Of Millions” Of Personal Records Stolen In Hack On Health Insurance Company Anthem
By 2.5.15
Any data breach is bad, but the more personal they are — and the more widespread — the worse. And by both metrics, the hack just announced by major health insurer Anthem is particularly terrible. [More]
Is Anthem Blue Cross’ Mail-Order Drug Requirement Discriminatory?
By 1.11.13
Anthem Blue Cross, the largest for-profit health insurance in California, will soon require that patients with some conditions can only get their prescriptions through a single mail-order pharmacy. However, some state officials think this could be against the law. [More]
Anthem BCBS Decides Boy Who Can’t Sit Up On His Own Doesn’t Need A Wheelchair
By 6.13.12
There’s a 2-year-old in New Jersey whose cerebral palsy makes it impossible for him to walk or even sit up without support. But according to the computers at Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield, he should give a cane a try before Anthem forks over the cash for a wheelchair. [More]
Anthem Blue Cross/Blue Shield Thinks Smoking And Depression Are Basically The Same Thing
By 2.1.12
Wellbutrin is an atypical antidepressant used to treat patients with depression, but it’s also effective when used short-term to help people quit smoking. As far as Anthem Blue Cross/Blue Shield is concerned, then, if you’re using Wellbutrin, you’re a smoker. For people whose health insurance comes from their employers, this isn’t as much of a problem. But the individual health insurance market is a cruel, unforgiving place where smokers pay higher premiums. And so reader Elizabeth’s husband, who quit smoking more than four years ago, is slapped with the smoker’s rate because he has a prescription for Wellbutrin, which they consider an “atypical tobacco product.” [More]
Woman Loses Insurance Because She Paid With Credit Card
By 9.21.11
Andrea has been a customer with Anthem since 1995, paying her bill all the time and never submitting any claims. So you can see why they canceled her coverage. [More]
Elderly Couple Thought They Canceled The Insurance, End Up Overpaying Anthem $5,000
By 8.1.11
By the time the couple in their 80’s noticed the monthly auto-billing on their bank account, they had overpaid Anthem $5,000 for insurance they thought they had canceled two years ago. That’s money these two living on pension could have been using to fix their crumbling front walkway. It was until they beseeched their local consumer reporter and he took an interest in their story did Anthem retroactively cancel their policy and refund their money. [More]
AMA: Health Insurers Still Making Errors On Nearly 20% Of Claims Processed
By 6.20.11
Last June, when the American Medical Association announced its finding that nearly one out of every five health insurance claims had been processed incorrectly, it had probably hoped it was giving the insurance biz a much needed kick in the pants. But one year and another AMA report card later, that statistic remains virtually unchanged. [More]
