Least competitive region on health insurance

A report released Thursday by a worker's rights organization says Indiana's private health insurance industry is a "near monopoly" and the Gary metropolitan area has the least competition in the state. The report, compiled by Health Care for America Now and released in Indiana by Central Indiana Jobs With Justice, says consolidation within the private health insurance industry is most to blame for huge increases in health care costs nationally and within the state. It also calls for a public insurance option to be included in any government reform package to create more competition. "We don't really have competition in the health care market that benefits anybody except for the big players," said Dr. Richard Stone, an emergency room physician in Bloomington who serves on the board of trustees with the Indiana State Medical Association. "When you look at how markets work, there seems to be great competition in the early phases and then they move toward consolidation. We're deep into the consolidation phase now." The report uses 2007 data culled by the American Medical Association. The two largest health insurers in the Gary metropolitan area -- Health Care Service Corp. (Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Illinois) and WellPoint Inc. -- combined to control 92 percent of the market, the highest concentration in the state. HCSC's share was 68 percent, while WellPoint held 24 percent. The next highest concentration rate was in Anderson, where WellPoint (72 percent) and UnitedHealth Group Inc. (15 percent) combined to control 87 percent of the market. "(92 percent) is an incredibly shocking number, but all of the market share numbers in Indiana are shocking," said Alex Lawson, a health care researcher at Institute for America's Future. He noted the U.S. Department of Justice's definition of a concentrated market, which is any one company having more than 42 percent market share. The report shows that as of 2007, Indiana's two largest private health insurers -- WellPoint and M*Plan -- controlled 75 percent of the market share. That placed Indiana 14th nationally among least competitive states. The report also says from 2000 to 2007, insurance premiums ...

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Tags: Health Insurance News

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 24th, 2009 at 2:31 am and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.