FARGO, N.D. (AP) - A Bismarck clinic says a move by the Federal Trade Commission and North Dakota attorney general to block a merger agreement with Dakotas-based Sanford Health lacks an understanding of health care delivery in western North Dakota.
The regulators last month filed a federal complaint alleging that the Sanford-Mid Dakota Clinic deal would violate antitrust law. The suit seeks a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to stop the deal until the matter can go to trial.
In their response filed Thursday, lawyers for Mid Dakota say the complaint ignores the potential benefits to patients and that the merger will not “substantially lessen competition” in the Bismarck-Mandan area. They say the suit should be dismissed.
“It elevates theory over facts and conjures purported anticompetitive effects from the challenged transaction that cannot be reconciled with market realities in North Dakota,” the defendants say of the lawsuit.
The complaint states that Sanford and Mid Dakota already are high-quality providers and have presented no evidence demonstrating how the transaction will improve the quality of care from either treatment center.
“Substantial harm to competition could occur immediately, including an increase in the costs that employers and their employees in the Bismarck-Mandan area incur for their health care and a reduction in the quality of health care administered,” the regulators say.
Shelly Seifert, chairwoman of the Mid Dakota board, said in a letter to patients last month that national, legal and economic experts have signed off on the deal and the regulators “simply have their facts and legal arguments wrong.”
Sanford Health was formed in 2009 when Sanford in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, merged with MeritCare in Fargo. Three years later, the new Sanford Health bought Medcenter One in Bismarck.
Sanford now bills itself as one of the largest health systems in the nation, with 45 hospitals and nearly 300 clinics in nine states and four countries.
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