After Two Megadeals Blocked, Health Insurers Plot Next Move

After 18 months of courtship and court cases, two massive deals that would have reshaped the U.S. health insurance industry have both been declared dead, blocked by judges who said they would do unacceptable harm to competition in the industry.

Now, the companies are right back where they started. Anthem Inc.’s $48 billion deal to buy Cigna Corp. was blocked by a federal judge late Feb. 8 (United States v. Anthem Inc., D.D.C., No. 16-cv-1493, 2/8/17), weeks after another judge halted Aetna ...