Latest news with #BlueShield
Business Wire
6 days ago
- Health
- Business Wire
Michelle Stoughton Named President of Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield Medicaid in Ohio
COLUMBUS, Ohio--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield (Anthem), a leading provider of health benefits for Ohio residents enrolled in the state's Medicaid managed care program, announced today that Michelle Stoughton has been named president of its Medicaid health plan. 'Michelle is a highly respected leader with extensive experience in healthcare policy and government,' said Jennie Reynolds, east region president of Anthem Medicaid. 'Her proven track record in Ohio and her dedication to community health make her exceptionally well-suited to lead our Medicaid operations in the state. We are confident in Michelle's ability to drive innovation, foster strong partnerships, and improve the whole health of the Ohioans we serve.' In her new role, Stoughton assumes responsibility for all aspects of Anthem's Medicaid health plan operations in Ohio, ensuring its more than 200,000 members receive access to innovative, high-quality healthcare and support services. She will also lead efforts to strengthen relationships in the community with state leaders, providers, and other key stakeholders. Starting in 2026, Anthem will be one of four managed care organizations to provide services to Ohioans who are dually eligible for both Medicare and Medicaid healthcare coverage under its Next Generation MyCare Ohio program, in addition to continuing to provide benefits through the managed care program. 'Anthem's long-standing commitment to improving the health of Ohio communities is one I deeply share, and I'm honored to take on this leadership role,' said Stoughton. 'I look forward to working alongside our state partners, providers, members, and local organizations to strengthen access to high-quality care—both today and as we prepare to support some of Ohio's most vulnerable individuals in the Next Generation MyCare Ohio program beginning in 2026. Together, we'll continue to serve with compassion, elevate health outcomes, and make a meaningful impact in the lives of Ohioans across the state.' Stoughton brings nearly 15 years of experience in healthcare policy to her new role. She most recently served as the regional vice president of government relations for Anthem in Ohio and managed the central region team of senior government relations directors for Anthem's parent company. Before that, Stoughton served as the Midwest director for Albers & Company and as government relations director for the Ohio Council of Retail Merchants. She has also served as a legislative aide in the Ohio House of Representatives. Stoughton holds a bachelor's degree from Miami University and a Master of Public Administration from The Ohio State University. She volunteers as coordinator of All Saints Episcopal Church's In the Garden Program, a meal service for homeless individuals in downtown Columbus. About Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in Ohio Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield is the trade name of Community Insurance Company, an independent licensee of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association. ANTHEM is a registered trademark of Anthem Insurance Companies, Inc. The Blue Cross and Blue Shield names and symbols are registered marks of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association. Additional information about Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in Ohio is available at Also, follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook, and X at @AnthemBCBS.
Business Journals
11-07-2025
- Business
- Business Journals
X CEO Linda Yaccarino departs; UCSF Health stays with Blue Shield
Happy Wednesday, Bay Area. At the top of the tech world this morning is news that X CEO Linda Yaccarino said she is stepping down from the company after two years at the helm, according to a Wednesday post on what was once called Twitter that said "the best is yet to come as X enters a new chapter with @xai." Billionaire owner Elon Musk's announcement in March that his xAI had acquired X at a valuation of $33 billion brought into question Yaccarino's future at the company, Bloomberg reports. Musk's SpaceX plans to raise new funding and launch an employee tender by selling insider shares at a $400 billion valuation, Bloomberg reports, as the company sees its fortunes rise on the back on its fast-growing Starlink satellite internet unit. In return-to-office news, national office foot traffic increased 8.3% year-over-year in June, according to data in the Office Index from last month. Overall, though, nationwide office visits were still down 27.4% compared to June 2019. And we end in Union Square, where a new location of popular Chinese toy store Pop Mart is coming, the SF Standard reports. The shop is set to open at 200 Powell St. in a green Art Deco building at the corner of O'Farrell later this year. And now on to the day's top headlines here in the city and across the Bay Area. GET TO KNOW YOUR CITY Find Local Events Near You Connect with a community of local professionals. Explore All Events Blue Shield and UCSF Health reach new agreement Blue Shield of California and UC Health announced on Tuesday they have reached a new agreement whereby UC Health will extend contracts pending the completion of formal contract renewal process. The move means that Blue Shield members can continue to access UC Health providers and UC Health providers will accept Blue Shield members as in-network. Blue Shield of California and UC Health had been in ongoing contract negotiations with a potential agreement expiration date of Aug. 9, which could have pushed UCSF Health out of network for Blue Shield members. UCSF renews big Mission Bay lease UCSF has secured a 147,000-square-foot lease renewal in Mission Bay's Alexandria Center at 499 Illinois St., the Registry reports. The transaction ranks among the quarter's most significant leases, according to a second-quarter 2025 market report by Newmark, alongside new deals from Coinbase's 150,671 square feet of space and LinkedIn's separate renewal of 150,000 square feet. Tri Counties Bank plans West Portal branch with familiar faces Tri Counties Bank is opening a new branch in San Francisco's West Portal neighborhood this summer. The branch is the former site of a First Republic Bank branch and will be led by former First Republic Bank employees. 'Our focus is to provide West Portal with a superior banking experience through personalized service and a full range of strategic financial solutions," Scott Robertson, senior vice president and head of community banking at Tri Counties Bank, said in a statement. Instead of traditional teller lines, the West Portal branch will feature five "relationship desks" where customers can sit down with a banker. Cruise lays off 100 workers San Francisco-based robotaxi company Cruise has announced 101 layoffs in the Bay Area, according to state WARN filings, as part of a broader restructuring to scale back its General Motors-backed operations. The lion's share of the layoffs — 85 of them — come at 1201 Bryant St. in San Francisco. An office at 840 W. California Ave. in Sunnyvale would also be affected. The job cuts are effective immediately. Sign up for the Business Times' free morning and afternoon daily newsletters to receive the latest business news driving change in San Francisco. Download the free San Francisco Business Times app for breaking news alerts on your phone. M&A Watch Meta (Nasdaq: META) is taking a 3% stake in Ray-Ban maker EssilorLuxottica for $3.5 billion in an effort to develop AI-powered smart glasses, Bloomberg reports. The market for smart glasses is expected to grow to $8.26 billion by 2030 from $1.93 billion in 2024, according to GrandView Research. People on the Move HTEC, a global digital engineering and product development company based in Palo Alto, has named Tim Sears as chief AI officer. Funding Watch South San Francisco-based Centivax has raised $45 million in Series A funding to advance its universal flu vaccine into human trials within eight months. Investors include Future Ventures, NFX, BOLD Capital, Amplify Partners, Kendall Capital and Base4 Capital. Funds will support clinical trials and enlarging a pipeline of vaccines. S.F.-based edtech Honor Education raised $38 million in Series A funding from Alpha Edison, Wasserstein & Co, Audeo Ventures, Interlock Partners and New Wave Capital. Palo Alto-based Sundial raised $16 million in Series A funding led by GreatPoint Ventures. Final thought … How about those Giants? If you didn't watch the final moment of last night's game against the Phillies, it's worth a look — especially with the help of announcer Dave Flemming's call. Meanwhile at the Business Times, don't forget to mark you calendar for our first Business of Sports event July 15 from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. at the United Club inside Chase Center. DOWNLOAD the free SFBT app for breaking news alerts on your phone.
Yahoo
10-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Blue Shield of California Recognized as a 2025 U.S. News & World Report Best Company to Work For
OAKLAND, Calif., July 10, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- U.S. News & World Report (U.S. News) has named Blue Shield of California to its 2025 list of Best Companies to Work For in both the Private Company, and Health Care and Research categories. "At Blue Shield, we aim to be a great place to do meaningful work. The high ratings we received for work-life balance, comfort and belongingness are encouraging confirmation of progress," said Haley Mixon, executive vice president and chief human resources officer, Blue Shield of California. "We will continue to listen and learn from our employees so that we can provide a workplace that best serves our talented workforce." U.S. News is a trusted resource on employee well-being and releases an annual list of public and private companies that are setting workplace standards. Companies are evaluated on several metrics including quality of pay and benefits, work-life balance and flexibility, physical and psychological comfort, career opportunities and professional development. To be considered private, companies must be non-publicly traded with more than 5,000 employees, more than $500 million in annual revenue, and have at least 75 U.S.-based Glassdoor reviews between 2021 and 2024. "This recognition reflects the dedicated employees at Blue Shield who uphold our mission every day," said Mike Stuart, interim president and CEO, Blue Shield of California. "Together we are committed to creating a healthcare system that is worthy of our family and friends and sustainably affordable. I am proud to serve alongside them as we pursue meaningful work that betters our community and California." About Blue Shield of CaliforniaBlue Shield of California strives to create a healthcare system worthy of its family and friends that is sustainably affordable. The health plan is a taxpaying, nonprofit, independent member of the Blue Shield Association with 6 million members, over 7,500 employees and more than $27 billion in annual revenue. Founded in 1939 in San Francisco and now headquartered in Oakland, Blue Shield of California and its affiliates provide health, dental, vision, Medicaid and Medicare healthcare service plans in California. The company has contributed more than $60 million to the Blue Shield of California Foundation in the last three years to have an impact on California communities. For more news about Blue Shield of California, please visit Or follow us on LinkedIn or Facebook. CONTACT: Mark SeeligBlue Shield of California510-607-2359media@ View original content to download multimedia: SOURCE Blue Shield of California
San Francisco Chronicle
09-07-2025
- Health
- San Francisco Chronicle
UC Health, Blue Shield of California reach new contract, avoiding disruptions to care
After weeks of contract negotiations that threatened to disrupt medical care for tens of thousands of Californians, UC Health and Blue Shield of California on Tuesday reached a new agreement. The deal means patients who get medical care at UCSF and five other UC Health academic medical centers statewide through Blue Shield can continue accessing services at in-network rates. This had been up in the air, with the previous contract slated to expire Aug. 9. If the two sides had not reached an agreement, patients would potentially have had to find a new doctor, new insurer, or pay out-of-network rates. The contract applies to people on CalPERS plans, employer plans, Covered California plans and Medicare plans (including Medicare Advantage) offered or administered by Blue Shield. In the Bay Area, this includes residents insured by Blue Shield who get care at UCSF Medical Center, UCSF Benioff Children's Hospitals, UCSF Medical Group, UCSF Benioff Children's Physicians and the primary care provider One Medical, a UCSF affiliate. UC Health and Blue Shield had been renegotiating contracts to establish how much Blue Shield will reimburse services provided by UC Health hospitals, clinics and other facilities. Such negotiations between providers and insurers are routine, though they have grown more public and contentious in recent years, often with both sides accusing the other of harming patients through higher prices or less accessible care. 'We are dedicated to ensuring members have access to affordable care and are pleased to be able to continue our partnership with UC Health,' Blue Shield of California said in a statement.
WIRED
02-07-2025
- Health
- WIRED
With RFK Jr. in Charge, Insurers Aren't Saying If They'll Cover Vaccines for Kids If Government Stops Recommending Them
Jul 2, 2025 10:25 AM RFK Jr.'s vaccine advisory board could stop recommending some routine childhood immunizations, leaving insurers to decide whether to still cover them. For now, most are remaining tight-lipped. Photograph:In the wake of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) announcing plans to revisit its recommended schedule for childhood vaccinations—a move that has drawn widespread criticism from experts—major insurers have not confirmed whether they'll continue to cover the full cost of routine shots for children. For 60 years ACIP has provided vaccine guidance to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), including on the timing and dosage of childhood immunizations. Insurers are required to cover the cost of most jabs on the recommended schedule for children. On Wednesday June 25, ACIP announced it would review the schedule, just weeks after health secretary and longtime anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. replaced the entire committee with his own appointees. When WIRED then asked 21 of the country's largest health insurance groups whether they would stop providing cost-free coverage of current routine immunizations in the event ACIP stops recommending them, only Blue Shield of California—a company in the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association—confirmed it would. 'As a payer our role is to ensure ongoing coverage and access to preventive, evidence-based care, including immunizations,' says company spokesperson Mark Seelig. 'Therefore, Blue Shield of California is committed to maintaining coverage of immunizations. The decision on whether to receive a vaccine is between our member and their provider.' Other large insurers, including UnitedHealthcare (which provides coverage for 50 million people), Cigna, Kaiser Permanente, Anthem, Humana, and Centene Corporation, did not respond to requests for comment. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan said it had no comment. Most insurers that did respond said they were keeping an eye on developments in Washington, without indicating whether they would or would not cover vaccines dropped from the recommended schedule. 'Vaccines play an important role in the prevention of more serious illnesses,' says Phil Blando, a spokesperson at CVS Health, which owns the insurer Aetna. 'We are monitoring any changes the federal government makes to vaccination guidance and eligibility and will evaluate whether coverage adjustments are needed.' Highmark Inc., part of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association, operating in Pennsylvania, Delaware, West Virginia, and New York, is also waiting to see what decision ACIP reaches. 'We are closely monitoring the evolving vaccine discussions occurring in Washington, DC. Various vaccines and immunizations are covered under Highmark's member benefits, with any future coverage considerations to be evaluated as more information becomes available,' says spokesperson Aaron Billger. Bryan Campen, of Health Care Service Corporation—the licensee of Blue Cross Blue Shield plans in Illinois, Montana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas—notes that no changes have yet been made to the vaccines ACIP recommends or the company's vaccine coverage, but says that the company will 'continue to monitor any activity that may impact preventive care recommendations and will communicate any changes to recommendations that may impact standard coverage of preventive services.' Insurers had an eye on changes in ACIP guidance even before the committee announced it would revisit the schedule. 'As we navigate an evolving health care landscape, maintaining robust immunization coverage continues to be a top priority for protecting both individual and community health,' the industry's trade association, AHIP, said in a June 24 statement, the day before ACIP's announcement. 'We are committed to ongoing coverage of vaccines to ensure access and affordability for this respiratory virus season,' the statement continued. 'We encourage all Americans to talk to their health care provider about vaccines.' ACIP made headlines in early June when RFK Jr. fired all 17 of its members and replaced them with eight new appointees. (The HHS secretary appoints the committee's members, but conventionally they serve fixed 4-year terms.) These new appointees include Retsef Levi, who has stated—in the face of scientific consensus—that mRNA vaccines are deadly, and Robert Malone, who routinely shares articles about supposed links between cancer and the Covid vaccine, which no credible research has found to exist. Neither Levi nor Malone replied to a request for comment. Michael A. Ross, another recently appointed committee member, resigned from ACIP during a review of his financial holdings, the New York Times reported on June 24. When introducing his new ACIP appointees in a post on X earlier in June, RFK Jr. had described Ross as a faculty member at George Washington and Virginia Commonwealth universities—but spokespeople for the universities told NBC News4 that Ross had not taught at either in years. Ross did not reply to a request for comment. The committee made news again on June 25 when, during its first meeting of the year, it announced it would form a working group to review the recommended immunization schedule for children and teens. 'The number of vaccines that our children and adolescents receive today exceed what children in most other developed nations receive, and what most of us in this room received when we [were] children,' ACIP chair Martin Kulldorff said during the meeting. He noted that the group would examine the 'cumulative effect' of the recommended vaccine schedule, including interactions between vaccines, the total number of vaccines given, their timing, and recipients' exposure to vaccine ingredients. But the process for adding vaccines to the schedule is already rigorous. Before a vaccine can receive FDA licensure, its manufacturer must prove it does not negatively affect the safety or immune response of other vaccines administered at the same time on the schedule, says Paul Offit, director of the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia's Vaccine Education Center. In addition, 'the notion that these vaccines are somehow weakening your immune system or overwhelming your immune system is fanciful,' Offit says. Today, children are exposed to fewer viral or bacterial proteins in the first few years of the vaccine schedule than those in earlier generations. When Offit's parents received the smallpox vaccine, they were exposed to 200 proteins in a single shot. In contrast, the measles vaccine only contains 10. During the meeting, Kulldorff repeated claims he made in 2024 that he was fired from Harvard because he refused to get the Covid vaccine; he and Malone have also each served as paid expert witnesses in two separate suits against Merck over the safety of the company's HPV vaccine and its mumps vaccine, respectively. Kulldorff did not reply to a request for comment. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) did not send representatives to last week's ACIP meeting, as it typically does. According to Academy president Susan Kressly, this was because the AAP believes the vaccine recommendation process lost credibility when its original membership was gutted by Kennedy. 'We won't lend our name or our expertise to a system that is being politicized at the expense of children's health,' Kressly said in a video posted online before the meeting was set to begin. The AAP did not reply to a request for comment about the video. The most recent child immunization schedule that the AAP endorses, from November 2024, is posted on the AAP website. A newer one, posted on the CDC site, has already changed recommendations. It no longer lists as 'routine' Covid vaccines for children under 18 who are not immunocompromised, but instead lists them under vaccines recommended for 'shared clinical decision-making,' informed by 'personal preference and circumstances.' The change should not affect insurance coverage.
