Aetna can't stop Medicaid contracts in Louisiana, judge rules

The Louisiana health department can move forward with its Medicaid contracts, even though Aetna is still sorting out its plans to appeal the department's decision to award those contracts to competing insurers, the Wall Street Journal reports. Aetna has alleged the process used by the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals was flawed and lacked transparency. "We are disappointed in today's decision and continue to have concerns with the manner in which the Medicaid contracts were awarded," Aetna said. "We believe that there were errors in the procurement process and in the scoring of the awards. We are evaluating all of our options and will make a decision shortly on how to proceed." Additionally, a separate judge ruled against the three insurers chosen to contract with Medicaid--Amerigroup, Centene, and UnitedHealth Group--to keep their information private and out of Aetna's hands. Article