Lifepoint Sues Insurers and MultiPlan, Alleging Anticompetitive 'Cartel' Suppresses Hospital Reimbursements

CHICAGO (LN) — Lifepoint Corporate Services filed a direct antitrust complaint in the Northern District of Illinois on June 2, alleging that insurers and MultiPlan formed an anticompetitive scheme to suppress out-of-network reimbursement rates. The suit seeks compensatory damages, treble damages, punitive damages, disgorgement, and injunctive relief.

The complaint, filed in MDL No. 3121, names Claritev Corp. f/k/a MultiPlan, Inc., Aetna, Inc., Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan Mutual Insurance Company, The Cigna Group, Elevance Health, Inc., Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Inc., Allied National, LLC, Central States Southeast and Southwest Areas Health and Welfare Fund, CareFirst of Maryland, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, and Health Net of California, Inc. as defendants.

Lifepoint, which operates 135 hospitals nationwide and is a portfolio company owned by a fund managed by Apollo Global Management, alleges that defendants engaged in hub-and-spoke conspiracies, principal-agent combinations, and anticompetitive information exchanges in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act.

The suit adopts the factual allegations of the Consolidated Master Direct Action Plaintiff Complaint, alleging that defendants used MultiPlan’s Data iSight algorithm to systematically repriced and underpaid Lifepoint’s out-of-network claims.

From October 1, 2024, through September 30, 2025, Lifepoint was underpaid millions of dollars on out-of-network claims submitted to users of MultiPlan’s services, the complaint states.

Representative claims cited in the complaint include a behavioral health claim with billed charges of $1,304 that Data iSight priced at $696, and a rehabilitation evaluation billed at $1,054.58 that was priced at $402.31.

Lifepoint alleges its damages are at least in the tens of millions of dollars, measured by the difference between lawful out-of-network reimbursement and the artificially suppressed amounts actually received.

The complaint argues that the suppression of reimbursement rates threatens access to essential medical care in the non-urban communities where Lifepoint is the sole provider, citing a 2020 Government Accountability Office report that rural hospital closures force residents to travel roughly 20 miles farther for acute care.

Health Net of California, a subsidiary of Centene Corporation, is specifically accused of abdicating out-of-network pricing authority to MultiPlan. The complaint states Health Net executives attended MultiPlan Client Advisory Board Meetings starting in 2019, where changes to the pricing methodology were communicated.

In the first quarter of 2025 alone, Health Net processed $44.6 million in changes through Data iSight, generating $36.3 million in underpayments, according to the complaint.

Lifepoint asserts that its in-network agreements with Aetna, Cigna, and Kaiser do not contain mandatory arbitration clauses that apply to the out-of-network claims at issue.

The U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division is investigating the MultiPlan Cartel, and MultiPlan acknowledged in an SEC filing on May 18, 2026, that it received a grand jury subpoena in August 2024 and has been cooperating with the investigation.