KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) - Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas City is pulling out of the federal health care exchanges in Kansas and Missouri next year because of mounting financial losses.
The company’s announcement Wednesday makes it just the latest insurer to drop out of the government-backed marketplaces that were a pillar of the Obama-era federal health care overhaul law. The nation’s third-largest insurer, Aetna, announced earlier this month that it will completely leave the exchanges for 2018.
Blue KC President and CEO Danette Wilson said in a statement that the company had lost more than $100 million on the exchanges through 2016 and described the losses as “unsustainable.” The exchanges began operating in 2014.
The release says about 67,000 members in western Missouri and eastern Kansas would be affected.
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