The United States Department of Justice, along with the Attorneys General in Minnesota and New York, have initiated a civil lawsuit to prevent the acquisition of Change Healthcare by UnitedHealth Group. The authorities argue that the proposed $13 billion transaction could potentially damage competition within the health insurance and essential technologies sectors.
As per a press release from the Justice Department, the complaint was lodged in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on February 24. It alleges that through this proposed merger, UnitedHealth—a company already of considerable size—would gain access to a significant volume of rival health insurers' competitively sensitive data. If this transaction were to be completed, it would enable UnitedHealth to utilize this information to its benefit, which could negatively impact competition within health insurance markets. Additionally, it would also remove the company's primary competitor for first-pass claims editing technology.
The Justice Department asserts that this proposed merger would lead to the elimination of Change—an independent entity providing participants for the healthcare ecosystem—including health insurance competitors as well as vital software and services like electronic data interchange (EDI) clearinghouse services.
"Quality health insurance should be accessible to all Americans," stated Attorney General Merrick Garland in the press release. "If America’s largest health insurer is permitted to acquire a major rival for critical healthcare claims technologies, it will undermine competition for health insurance and stifle innovation in the employer health insurance markets. The Justice Department is committed to challenging anticompetitive mergers, particularly those at the intersection of healthcare and data."
Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Doha Mekki from the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division added: "The proposed transaction threatens an inflection point in the healthcare industry by giving United control of a critical data highway through which about half of all Americans’ health insurance claims pass each year. Unless the deal is blocked, United stands to see and potentially use its health insurance rivals’ competitively sensitive information for its own business purposes and control these competitors’ access to innovations in vital healthcare technology."
