Judge John Bates of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia said during a hearing on Wednesday that the companies had failed to define any harm that would be caused by setting the date in December.
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The trial will run for 13 days and a decision is expected to be taken in mid-January.
A federal judge said Wednesday that he would begin trial proceedings on December 5 in the Justice Department’s antitrust challenge to the proposed merger of Aetna Inc. and Humana Inc. Federal regulators have argued that the deal, combined with the proposed merger of rivals Cigna by Anthem, will provide fewer health insurance choices for consumers and drive up prices – particularly in the Medicare Advantage markets that Humana and Aetna now dominate.
The companies dispute assertions that their planned mergers would result in public harm, contending that lawyers for the US are mistaken about their market definitions. The judge was apparently “struck” by Aetna’s inability to explain how it would be harmed by a delayed trial date, according to legal news site Law360.
Both cases were initially assigned to Judge Bates, a George W. Bush appointee, but last week the judge sent the Anthem case for reassignment to another judge, saying it wasn’t feasible for him to handle both in an expeditious fashion. The Justice Department claims that the companies could voluntarily extend the option date, if they’re still interested in combining operations.
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Key to the case is Aetna’s argument that its Medicare Advantage product competes with government Medicare. “The date does have consequences”, he said. Earlier this month, he handed off the suit from DOJ over the pending Anthem/Cigna merger to U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson.
