One of the state's newest health insurance companies, Community Health Options, is pulling out of New Hampshire.
Community Health Options is the exact type of business that was supposed to make the individual insurance market more competitive under the Affordable Care Act. In 2014, the first year it was in operation, Community Health Options dominated the individual market in Maine. In 2015, it expanded into New Hampshire with a federal loan.
And that's when things got complicated.
Claims were higher than expected because people who got insurance for the first time in years had been putting off doctors visits for a while. The company projected bigger and bigger losses.
Community Health Options will now focus only on its business in Maine, leaving consumers in New Hampshire with fewer choices in 2017 beyond the state's largest health insurers.
