UnitedHealth chopped its 2015 earnings forecast and the nation’s largest health insurer has begun to question its future in public insurance exchanges, a key element in the nation’s health care overhaul.
The company said Thursday that it would pull back on the marketing of its exchange business, a few weeks after open enrollment for that coverage began nationwide. It also said that it will decide in the first half of next year “to what extent it can continue to serve the public exchange markets in 2017.”
The announcement marks a dramatic shift for the Minneapolis insurer, which said just last month that it was expanding into 11 more exchanges next year.
Chief Financial Officer David Wichmann told analysts in October that the company expected its exchange business to be “strikingly better” in 2016 and that the exchanges will mature into a strong growth market.
The company still plans to expand into more exchanges, but medical claims have come in higher than expected on the exchanges overall, and its business in particular has deteriorated.