According to Politico, the healthcare insurer Humana will completely withdraw from the Affordable Care Act exchange program in 2018, leaving a sizable dent in the Obamacare market.
This would make Humana the first major health insurance company to walk away from Obamacare. The company states that it has come to this decision due to the fact that it stands to lose $45 million in 2017 on Obamcare business.
“We are again seeing signs of an unbalanced risk pool based on the results of the 2017 open enrollment period,” CEO Bruce Broussard said in an investor call. “Therefore we’ve decided we can’t continue to offer this coverage in 2018.”
President Donald Trump's administration is said to soon introduce new rules that would convince insurers to stick around, however Broussard doesn't believe there's anything that could convince his company to stick around.
“We’re really feeling that this organization needs to stay focused on what we do well, and I think what we do well is serving chronic conditions,” he said. “I think it’s going to be hard for us to get back into that marketplace.”
This news comes on the heels of a failed $32 billion merger with health insurer Aetna, who refused to fight a court ruling that blocked the deal on anti-trust grounds. While this has little to do with Obamacare, the nebulous future of healthcare policy made it too difficult to determine a good reason to remain in the program.
