In what could be a portentous signal for the fate of a healthcare mega merger, skeptics from labor unions filled a St. Paul church this week to voice concerns — sometimes raucously so — about the proposed joining of two big nonprofit health systems: Allina Health and Sutter Health.
The Office of the Minnesota Attorney General held the first public forum this week on the proposed acquisition of the Upper Midwest’s health giant Allina by the even bigger California system, Sutter Health.
Sutter Health, the fourth biggest health system in California by number of staffed patient beds, has been accused of driving up costs for Californians through anti-competitive behavior in two lawsuits brought by unions, employers, individuals and California’s attorney general. After over a decade of litigation, the health system paid settlements of $575 million and $228 million in the lawsuits, fractions of what the plaintiffs were estimated to have overpaid — $1.2 billion and $411 million, respectively. The settlements also barred Sutter from some anti-competitive practices…