Jackson Health employees will see health insurance switched next year

Miami Herald, October 7, 2011

A year after forcing all 11,000 of its employees into the Jackson Health System insurance plan, Jackson executives reversed course Thursday, announcing that the system's employees will be moved next year into the same AvMed plans offered to other county employees. "The majority of employees really don't like the Jackson health plan," CEO Carlos Migoya told the system's governing board Thursday. He said that when he told employees in recent town hall meetings about the possible change to AvMed, he received "almost a standing ovation." Still, the main motivation for the change, approved unanimously by the board Thursday, was about cutting losses. The JMH Health Plan has lost about $30 million so far this fiscal year. For several years, Jackson's previous executive team, led by Eneida Roldan, had been trying to build up the health plan as a way to make money for the financially troubled public hospital system.