Illinois to pursue antitrust claims against hospitals

A Champaign County judge will allow the Illinois attorney general to continue pursuing a lawsuit that accuses two eastern Illinois hospitals of turning away Medicaid patients to force bigger state payments. The judge denied most of a series of motions filed by Carle Clinic Association of Urbana and Christie Clinic of Champaign seeking to dismiss the antitrust lawsuit piece by piece. The Attorney General's office accuses the hospitals of conspiring to deny primary care to Medicaid patients to push people toward more expensive emergency rooms.