This should be a wake-up call for policy makers. No more networks, no more tinkering: Maine needs fundamental health care system change
Portland, Maine; November 4, 2025
Mainers are caught in a confusing maze of contradictory information after the contract between Northern Light Health and Anthem expired on November 1st. Northern Light Health is Maine’s second largest health system, providing care in key rural areas and healthcare deserts. Anthem is communicating that Northern Light Health providers will not remain within its network. Northern Light Health is indicating that their providers will remain “in network.”
“When our health insurers and our health systems negotiate and control patient access, Maine lives are threatened. This is a replay of a very similar situation between Anthem and MaineHealth about three years ago. No doubt we will be here again until our leaders choose to solve the problems in our healthcare system once and for all,” said Dr. Julie Pease of Topsham, Board Chair of Maine AllCare.
Meanwhile, approximately 30,000 Mainers are in limbo trying to understand how to navigate their healthcare needs in a state plagued by closures and staggering healthcare insurance rate hikes. Absent correct information, Mainers are poised to encounter higher costs and surprise bills. They may need to travel farther for care, increasing costs of transportation, need for day care and time off of work.
“Maine can lead, but we must stop repeating the same mistakes that put Mainers’ lives at risk. Our healthcare system regularly teeters on the brink, exposing the fragility of our lifesaving infrastructure, while corporations and insurers negotiate profits instead of protecting the health of our people. Maine must act now to stabilize our healthcare system with universal coverage—or take responsibility for the lives lost to political gamesmanship and corporate profiteering.” – Dr. Tom Sterne of Bridgton, Treasurer of Maine AllCare.
Healthcare networks allow insurers to limit the amount of money they pay out and maximize profits. As for-profit corporations, this is what they are chartered to do. It is a failure of public policy that permits profit-driven companies to control so much of the healthcare system. The United States is the only developed country in the world to do so.
“It is time to rethink our priorities and our values. It’s time to declare our decades-long experiment with market-driven, for-profit healthcare a failure,” said Dr. Pease. “This should be a wake-up call for policy makers. They need to receive this demand from all of us: We want a universal healthcare system in Maine and the time is now for fundamental change.”
Maine AllCare advocates for a universal program—everybody in, nobody out—for the whole state that would eliminate this kind of negotiation that puts Anthem’s customers at risk. Everyone would be in the program, with no deductibles and few, if any co-pays.. We would all pay fees according to our incomes and receive care when we need it—the way other developed countries do with their humane and popular country-wide healthcare systems.
In a universal healthcare system there would be no need for insurance companies or networks. All providers would be in the program, and the state could implement meaningful cost controls.
Studies done right here in Maine show that by controlling costs and getting rid of waste and excess profits a healthcare system could cover all of us for about what we are currently spending on health care in Maine.
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About Maine AllCare
Founded in 2010, Maine AllCare promotes the establishment of publicly funded healthcare coverage for all Maine residents. This system must be efficient, financially sound, politically sustainable and must provide benefits fairly distributed to all. We advocate that healthcare, a basic necessity, be treated as a public good, since it is fundamental to our well-being as individuals and as a democratic nation.