NFL Defeats Appeal Over Medical Coverage for Retired Players

The National Football League defeated an appeal by an Illinois medical clinic over coverage of retired players’ medical bills, when the Fifth Circuit ruled that the clinic’s economic interference claim was preempted by the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act.

The “essence” of Advanced Physicians SC’s lawsuit is that the NFL wrongly facilitated a denial of coverage for health benefits, the appeals court said Thursday. Because ERISA “allows beneficiaries like Advanced to vindicate that claim,” the practice’s claim for tortious interference with patient relationships was properly dismissed as preempted by the federal statute, according to the unpublished opinion from the ...