The Mississippi House of Representatives has voted to have the Division of Medicaid rebid contracts for its managed care program in the state.
The move has been made to give the state’s only provider-sponsored insurance plan – the non-profit Mississippi True – another chance to land a contract. The amendment is part of the House’s revised Medicaid technical bill.
Medicaid had previously awarded contracts to United Healthcare, Magnolia Health and Molina Healthcare – all out-of-state health insurers. Not long after the announcement of the winners of the previous bid, Mississippi True and another insurer filed a lawsuit against the Division of Medicaid, claiming that the agency had a particular bias for those other companies.
A previous version of the Medicaid bill would have given Mississippi True a small managed care contract, mandating that the former transfer 10% of the managed care population to the latter under the pretense of a “pilot program.” Under the new bill, each company in the program is guaranteed at least 20% of the managed care population.
By voting to have the Division of Medicaid hold another contract bidding round, the agency now has to abandon the approximately $3 billion a year contracts it has managed to secure from the previous bid, Mississippi Today reported.
Several legislators have commented that voting to have the Division of Medicaid rebid was setting a risky precedent. Some have even pointed out that the gesture means the legislature can now cherry-pick agency contracts.
“I’m all for Mississippi True. I think we should have a provider-sponsored contract, but is this the way the legislature should work, come in and redo the bidding process after it’s already been bid?” commented Rep. Jarvis Dortch, D-Jackson.
Other legislators, such as Rep. Jason White, R-West, pointed out that giving more than 10% of the population to the non-profit would make it less of a pilot program and more of “a straight no-bid contract to the hospitals.”
Mississippi True is a non-profit insurance plan comprised of 60 hospitals based in the state. Despite having the full support of the state’s influential Hospital Association, many cried foul when the insurance plan failed to win a contract last summer.
