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Health insurance giant Blue Shield of California is notifying millions of people of a data breach. The company confirmed on Wednesday that it had been sharing patients’ private health information with tech and advertising giant Google since 2021. The insurer said that the data sharing stopped in January 2024, but it only learned this February that the years-long collection contained patients’ personal and sensitive health information. Blue Shield said it used Google Analytics to track how its customers used its websites, but a misconfiguration had allowed for personal and health information to be collected as well, such as the search...

Anyone with an Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield plan will soon have to pay out of pocket for anesthesia if a surgery or procedure goes longer than expected, according to the American Society of Anesthesiologists. The health insurance provider said they will no longer pay for anesthesia care if a surgery or procedure goes beyond a specific time limit. This will apply to patients in Connecticut, New York and Missouri. The American Society of Anesthesiologists said Anthem can pre-determine the time allowed for anesthesia, and if an anesthesiologist submits a bill where the actual time of care is longer than...

A federal jury in Detroit awarded more than $12 million Friday to a former Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan (BCBSM) employee who was terminated after declining to get a COVID-19 vaccination, citing religious discrimination. According to the verdict form, Lisa Domski, who worked at the insurance company for more than 30 years as an IT specialist, received $10 million in punitive damages against Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan. The jury also awarded her approximately $1.7 million in lost wages and $1 million in noneconomic damages. Domski claimed she was a victim of religious discrimination after the company denied...

A federal jury has awarded $687,000 to a research scientist who was fired from BlueCross BlueShield in Tennessee for refusing to comply with the company’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate.Tanja Benton, who had worked 16 years at the firm when she was fired, was awarded $177,240 in back pay, $10,000 in compensation, and $500,000 in punitive damages, according to a document made public by the federal court in eastern Tennessee on June 30.Company officials told Ms. Benton in August of 2021 that she would need to be “fully vaccinated” to keep her position, according to her lawsuit. Ms. Benton refused, saying aborted...

A Tennessee jury has awarded a former research scientist at BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee $687,000 in back pay and damages after she was fired in 2021 for refusing to take the COVID-19 vaccine.Following a three-day jury trial in Chattanooga last week, a federal jury decided BlueCross failed to provide reasonable accommodation for Tanja Benton, who did most of her work from home and claimed a religious exemption to the company's vaccine mandate. Chattanooga Attorney Doug S. Hamill, who represents Benton, said the biostatistical research scientist was fired in November 2021 in violation of her religious beliefs after working for the...

This raises some serious questions. . World-famous cardiologist Dr. Peter McCullough recently revealed startling figures about the immense earnings doctors received for pushing the COVID-19 injections. On the Tommy T Podcast, Dr. McCullough claimed that a typical doctor could make an extra $250,000 if they injected a substantial portion of their patients. More specifically, if a doctor injected 75% of his or her patients at $250 per newly-injected person, that would end up being around $250,000. This revelation was discovered through a leaked Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield document. ... Dr. McCullough explained that a full-time primary care physician typically...

Sen. Todd Young (R-IN) will not vote for his own party’s nominee for president, he said Tuesday. The establishment politician’s statement that he will not vote for Donald Trump comes days after the former president locked up the party’s nomination. Young had indicated earlier he would not endorse Trump, but Tuesday is the first time he admitted publicly he will not even vote for his party’s standard bearer. “At some point, principled conservatives need to incentivize our party, the Republican Party, to nominate somebody that principled conservatives can actually believe in,” Young told a local Indiana outlet. “Stated differently, I’m...

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas has changed a policy that denied sex reassignment surgery to people who did not legally change their names, the company confirmed Thursday. The change came after the American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas and the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund raised the issue on behalf of Charley Osman, a transgender man, who was rejected after he sought pre-authorization in June for two surgeries. “I’m pretty sure I’m not the first person to go through this, but I want to be sure I’m the last,” Osman said in a news release issued by...

Posted on January 12, 2021 Here’s all the companies boycotting Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley, and other Republicans for objecting last weekFiled Under: Mark Speaks

Three major corporations are reportedly halting donations to Republican lawmakers who argued for election integrity and adherence to the Constitution. Popular Information reports that the corporations are citing last week’s riot at the Capitol, and alleging Republican lawmakers “encouraged the rioters by objecting to the certification of the Electoral College vote.” The outlet contacted corporations who donated to Republicans in the past and asked if they would continue to do so. Out of 144 companies contacted, Popular Information received a commitment from three to no longer donate to anybody who objected to the election results. The three corporations are: Blue...

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas is agreeing to pay a $10 million fine and issue refunds to consumers after a state review found billing mistakes in the insurer’s handling of out-of-network emergency claims. The Texas Department of Insurance announced the fine and restitution agreement Friday. Richardson-based Blue Cross will begin sending out notices to affected consumers by May 1. The state said its review found: Incorrect information about how to resolve bill balances on explanation of benefits forms sent to HMO members receiving out-of network emergency care. Delays in processing out-of-network claims that went through a review process Blue...

Hugh Hewitt kicked off his radio show on Friday by thanking his guest, former Maryland Congressman John Delaney, for "saving his blue cross." His health care. Unlike some of his leftist opponents, Delaney does not endorse the Medicare for All plan, which would kick 250 million Americans off of their private insurance plans and give government the reins. "The American people want choices," Delaney protested. "And they ought to have them. It's also about economics, as you know." Other moderates agree. Delaney's fellow presidential contender Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO) was able to tell Sanders face-to-face last night at the 2020...

Yesterday I finished up my obamacare enrollment. I know, I could auto-renew but year after year I keep thinking "It's gotta get better than this." No such luck. But I discovered yet another thing about our fascist medicine healthcare program that I find disturbing. Monday is cleanup day for my Windows machine so first thing I ran a full anti-virus scan and a CCleaner scan for tracking cookies. As usual CCleaner found and removed about 40 tracking cookies and found no registry issues. Then I moved on to the healthcare.gov renewal task. This was simplified by the fact that we...

Because of market turmoil and decisions by United Healthcare and Aetna to withdraw from Affordable Care Act exchanges in Pennsylvania for 2017, the remaining insurer in the Philadelphia area, Independence Blue Cross, has been granted bigger rate increase — 28 percent — than it requested in the spring, the state Insurance Department said Monday. Insurance Commissioner Teresa Miller said additional companies beyond United and Aetna were considering ending their ACA individual-exchange businesses in Pennsylvania. If that happened, some counties might have been left without any offerings on the exchange, which is where individuals have to buy plans to qualify for...

Tennessee is ground zero for ObamaCare’s nationwide implosion. Late last month the state insurance commissioner, Julie Mix McPeak, approved premium increases of up to 62% in a bid to save the exchange set up under the Affordable Care Act. “I would characterize the exchange market in Tennessee as very near collapse,” she said. Then last week BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee announced it would leave three of the state’s largest exchange markets—Nashville, Memphis and Knoxville. “We have experienced losses approaching $500 million over the course of three years on ACA plans,” the company said, “which is unsustainable.” As a result, more...

Cox told Business Insider that the situation in Pinal County will likely raise calls for a public option, or a government-run health insurance option similar to Medicare or Medicaid.

The partial withdrawal of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota from the ObamaCare marketplace, driven out by staggering financial losses, is another important milestone in the collapse of the ill-conceived and inaccurately named Affordable Care Act. Providers have been bailing out of ObamaCare across the land, but not Blue Cross/Blue Shield providers. It’s not a total departure from the market, as CEO Michael Guyette took pains to explain at the Minneapolis Star-Tribune: In a sign of continuing tumult in the health insurance industry, the state’s largest insurer said Thursday it will no longer offer its traditional suite of flexible...

In the face of losses in the Affordable Care Act marketplace, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois is looking for new ways to cut spending. Starting June 1, the Chicago-based health insurer will no longer accept credit cards as a form of payment for members who buy their own health insurance on or off the Illinois marketplace. The company began notifying customers of the change last month. Blue Cross will still accept other forms of payment, including debit cards. The new payment policy will not affect customers in the group or Medicare markets. In an email announcing the new...

Year 2 of the Affordable Care Act was another financial flop for the Chicago-based parent of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois but hints of a turnaround are emerging. Health Care Service Corp.'s financial losses in its individual business, which includes ACA plans, worsened in 2015. The company, which owns Blue Cross affiliates in Illinois and four other states, said it lost $1.5 billion in its individual business, up from $767 million in 2014, the first year of the health law's state exchanges for buying coverage.

North Carolina's largest health insurer says high costs are forcing it to seek higher premium increases than expected. Two months ago, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina said it wanted to raise rates by an average of almost 26 percent in January 2016. But now it's seeking an average 35 percent higher premium for insurance sold under Obamacare. North Carolina is not the only state facing steep raises. A study by the Kaiser Family Foundation says dozens of health insurers across the country are increasing premiums well beyond 10 percent for next year.