SPOKANE — Lobbying behind closed doors, Washington’s largest health insurance company persuaded Republicans in the state Senate to gut a widely supported bill that aimed to reveal health care price and quality information to consumers.
The battle pits Premera Blue Cross against a broad coalition representing just about everyone who buys, uses, provides or shapes health care: small and large businesses, consumer advocates, tribes, hospitals, doctors, nurses, the governor, the insurance commissioner, the agency that governs insurance for state employees and the poor, and even Premera’s competitors.
