Maine’s Nonprofit Health Insurer Sets Aside $43M to Cover Potential Losses

The lone health insurance cooperative to make money in 2014 on the Affordable Care Act’s public insurance exchanges saw big losses in 2015 and is now setting aside $43 million to cover possible big losses this year.

Officials with the Lewiston, Maine-based Community Health Options tell the Portland Press Herald that premiums are likely to go up. Officials did not say how much rates will be increased, but the cooperative plans to submit its proposal to state insurance regulators in May.

Community Health Options posted a $31 million loss in 2015. Those losses led the cooperative to stop individual enrollments of new customers in December, weeks before the end of the enrollment period.

Community Health was the only cooperative in the country to make money during its first year.