PROVIDENCE – R.I. Attorney General Peter F. Neronha announced Tuesday that he filed objections with the R.I. Office of the Health Insurance Commissioner in response to requests made by six health insurers to increase rates next year.
Neronha says he is urging the state health insurance commissioner’s office to reject the rate increases given residents are facing many economic struggles, including inflation and higher costs for goods and housing. He says the rate increase requests would impact more than 166,000 residents enrolled in the insurers’ various group insurance plans.
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Cigna Group; United HealthCare Services Inc., which operates United HealthCare of New England; Aetna Inc.; Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island; Harvard Pilgrim Health Care; and Neighborhood Health Plan of Rhode Island are the six insurers that requested rate increases, Neronha said.
Neronha says his office focused solely on the insurers themselves, and recent public comments highlight “enormous profits” the insurers have made recently, in some cases “billions of dollars.” Aetna, the health insurer whose parent company is CVS Health Corp. and which requested a 6.6% rate increase in the large group market, Neronha said, brought in $91.4 billion in revenue in 2022. That revenue, Neronha says, contributed to CVS’ year of outperformance in which the company reported more than $300 billion in total revenue.
“Rhode Islanders should not bear the full weight of rising health care costs alone. It should be a shared responsibility borne by all stakeholders including health insurance companies,” Neronha said in a statement. “By preventing health insurers from passing increased costs through to consumers, we create an incentive for stakeholders to work together to improve our health care system and strengthen it.”
James Bessette is the PBN special projects editor, and also covers the nonprofit and education sectors. You may reach him at Bessette@PBN.com. You may also follow him on Twitter at @James_Bessette. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
