In The News 21 February 2026

AG Yost joins Department of Justice to sue OhioHealth for anticompetitive health-care contracts

COLUMBUS — An antitrust lawsuit alleging that OhioHealth limits competition and drives up health-care costs for patients and employers was filed Friday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost announced.  

“When competition is blocked, consumers end up being the biggest losers,” Yost said. “My office stands with the Justice Department in our determination to eliminate these types of unfair practices and protect Ohioan’s wallets.” 

The federal lawsuit, filed by the Department of Justice in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, contends that OhioHealth uses its market strength to force insurers to include OhioHealth in all their commercial insurance networks. That practice prevents insurers from offering lower-priced health-plan options in central Ohio.

“Americans deserve low-cost, high-quality healthcare – not anticompetitive hospital system contracts that make healthcare less affordable,” said Attorney General Pamela Bondi. “Under President Trump’s leadership, this Department of Justice will continue taking legal action to protect consumers and drive down healthcare costs across America."

The lawsuit seeks to stop OhioHealth’s restrictions so insurers can include more affordable, innovative plan options in their contracts with OhioHealth and in the commercial insurance products they sell to employers and families.

The complaint alleges these practices violate the federal Sherman Act and Ohio’s Valentine Act, both of which prohibit anticompetitive conduct that harms consumers. These restrictions limit competition and block the development of budget-conscious plans that would allow patients to choose high-quality, lower-cost providers. Without those options, employers and families face fewer choices and higher premiums.

OhioHealth owns or manages 16 hospitals and outpatient facilities throughout Ohio.

The Attorney General’s Office is standing with federal partners to protect consumers and restore competition in Ohio’s health-care marketplace.

Add new comment

This is not for publication.
This is not for publication.
About text formats

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Web page addresses and email addresses turn into links automatically.
Article comments are not posted immediately to the Web site. Each submission must be approved by the Web site editor, who may edit content for appropriateness. There may be a delay of 24-48 hours for any submission while the web site editor reviews and approves it. Note: All information on this form is required. Your telephone number and email address is for our use only, and will not be attached to your comment.
CAPTCHA This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions. Image CAPTCHA
Enter the characters shown in the image.