Hospitals, doctors and pharmacies are losing up to $1 billion a day due to a cyberattack on one of America’s largest health insurers.
Last month, the cyber gang BlackCat hacked Change Healthcare, a subsidiary of United Healthcare, which reportedly processes 15 billion medical and pharmaceutical claims, totaling more than $1.5 trillion annually.
It mainly affected the company’s Optum mail-order pharmacy service and disrupted its computer networks. With networks down, insurance payments for prescription drugs could not be processed, leaving many hospitals and doctors responsible for the bills upfront in the hope that they will eventually be reimbursed.
And because pharmacies can’t process the payments, desperate Americans are forced to hand over potentially thousands of dollars for drugs that would normally be covered by insurance and cost much less or ration their current supply.
Seattle-area native Olivia Coltrane said her regular prescription of generic Vyvance to treat her ADHD normally costs about $3, but she had to pay $92 for her most recent one, a markup of nearly 3,000 percent.
Ms Coltrane previously told DailyMail.com that she had to contact her doctor and pharmacy four times before she could get the medication – and even when she did, she only received a two-week supply.
Afraid she will run out and not be able to refill it, she told DailyMail.com: “All I can do is hope they have it in stock.”
The number of cyber attacks on healthcare providers has more than doubled since 2016: 91 per year in 2021 compared to 43 five years ago
About half of U.S. healthcare systems rely on Change Healthcare, and experts estimate the hack will cause a huge financial dent.
Max Reale, an analyst at investment bank Compass Point, said providers could lose between $500 million and $1 billion in daily revenue.
In addition, Chip Kahn, CEO of the Federation of American Hospitals, said Axios: ‘I know of some systems that bill $40 or $50 million a day. They’ve raised about $800 million so far.”
Meanwhile, in Arizona, Margaret Brown, 50, struggled for weeks to secure her son’s insulin for his type 1 diabetes.
In late February, she called for a refill and was told by a pharmacist that a recent breach had disrupted their ability to fill scripts and bill insurance.
In late February, she called for a refill and was told by a pharmacist that a recent breach had disrupted their ability to fill scripts and bill insurance.
Normally, Ms. Brown spends zero dollars for a month’s worth of insulin, but this time she would have to pay $400.
She told DailyMail.com that because he still had some insulin left, she waited a while before calling the pharmacy back to see if her claim had been processed.
She said: ‘I went to the pharmacy and asked again. And they never called me or anything. I happened to go there and they said it was done and it was going ahead.
“So he didn’t go without, but if he wanted to go without, I would have had to pay the $400.”
The February 21 hack forced Change Healthcare to disconnect all its systems to reduce the risk of an even bigger attack.
But that move led to the suspension of more than 100 services.
Under normal circumstances, hospitals and physicians submit insurance claims to cover all or part of their patients’ care.
But with the system in its current state, they can’t do that, which hurts their bottom line and ultimately the quality of care they can deliver.
The impact of the group’s hack is so severe that the federal government announced Saturday that it will distribute emergency funds to providers to ease the financial problems they may face.
Change Healthcare also launched a temporary financing program for providers struggling with cash flow after the cyberattack.
It requires the money to be refunded and gives no indication of when the normal billing process would resume.
Optum Financial Services, through which the program is offered, said: “We have been able to estimate your average weekly payments, which will form the basis for the support.
“Our plan is to take this week by week, with people raising money each week as needs continue.”
For its part, UnitedHealth Group has not proposed a date for when the issues will be resolved.