PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Maine’s highest court has dismissed Anthem insurance company’s appeal of how the state insurance superintendent allowed for no profits in setting the company’s rates.

Anthem Health Plans of Maine appealed a lower court decision that affirmed the superintendent’s decision to reduce Anthem’s proposed 2009-2010 rate increase for individual health plans from 18.1 percent to 10.9 percent — a rate that contained a zero percent projected profit margin.

In a 5-2 ruling Thursday, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court dismissed the appeal as moot because the year in which the challenged rates were effective has passed and new rates have gone into effect.

In a dissenting opinion, Justices Jon Levy and Andrew Mead said the appeal should proceed because the core legal issues arise each year during the annual rate-approval process.


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