Health co-ops lost millions in 2015; some expect 2016 profits

The Affordable Care Act's health insurance co-ops absorbed deep financial losses last year, and 2016 is shaping up to be a make-or-break year for these nonprofit alternatives to traditional insurers. But it's too late for the Knoxville-based Community Health Alliance, which shut down at the end of 2015 after state officials said its "financial success could not be guaranteed." "Ultimately, the risk of CHA's potential failure in 2016 was too great and would have caused substantial detrimental effects on the market as a whole if it were to collapse," TDCI Commissioner Julie Mix McPeak said in October when announcing the co-op would "wind down."