Highmark-UPMC legal fight sent back to lower court

By NATASHA
LINDSTROM

The state Supreme Court on Tuesday sent Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s legal push against UPMC back to a lower court to determine whether the looming split of health care rivals UPMC and Highmark can be delayed in the name of public interest.

In a split ruling, the state’s highest court ordered the state’s Commonwealth Court to hold an expedited hearing on the fate of 2014 state-brokered agreement between UPMC and Highmark. In April, the Commonwealth Court ruled that the agreement’s June 30 end date could not be changed. Shapiro had appealed that ruling to the state Supreme Court.

“At this juncture, we do not deem it necessary to extend the termination date of the Consent Decrees through the extraordinary powers that (the Office of Attorney General) asks us to invoke,” Justice David Wecht wrote in the 22-page document. “Although the presently applicable termination date is near, the dispositive legal question is narrow, and the evidentiary record that is necessary to resolve that question accordingly will be limited. We are confident that the skilled advocates before us will be able to marshal adequate extrinsic evidence of the parties’ intent expeditiously, and to promptly build a narrowly focused record sufficient for the fact-finder to interpret the contested provision.”

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