Humana To Leave Vast Majority Of Obamacare Markets After Massive Losses

After accruing $1 billion in losses, Humana, one of the largest health care providers in the country, has made the decision to eventually leave the vast majority of the Obamacare markets (via The Hill):

Humana, one of the nation’s top health insurers, is pulling out of ObamaCare plans in all but a handful of states after a year of nearly $1 billion in losses.The company plans to exit nearly half of its Obamacare markets next year, the company announced during an earnings report Thursday. It will take part in “no more” than 11 state marketplaces, down from 19 states this year, the company said.

Humana’s decision to exit “substantially all” of the state exchanges comes the same day that the Obama administration announced it would step in to block a multi-billion dollar merger between Humana and Aetna. Both are among the so-called “big five” of the nation’s major health insurers.

Guy has written extensively about the shaky financial foundations health care providers have found themselves in under the new health care. Since the beginning of the year, the stories about massive losses and possible withdrawals from the Obamacare markets, UnitedHealth said they’d be removing themselves from most of the markets by 2017. Blue Cross and Blue Shield is another. Out of the 23 Obamacare co-ops that were established only seven remain, virtually all of them under threat of folding by the end of this year. As for the exchanges, billions of taxpayer dollars have been wasted in that venture as well. In all, it’s not working, folks.