Legal Library: Cases and Proceedings

A physician-hospital organization operating in northwestern South Carolina, agreed to settle charges that it orchestrated and carried out agreements among its physician members to set the prices they would accept from health plans, and to refuse to deal with health plans that did not agree to its collectively determined prices. The consent order settling the FTC’s charges prohibits the PHO from collectively negotiating with health plans on behalf of its physicians and from setting terms of dealing with purchasers.

A consent order settled charges that the White Sands Health Care System refused to deal with health care insurers that resisted the collectively negotiated prices set by its member physicians and nurse anesthetists. The complaint alleged that these practices increased costs for health care for consumers in the Alamogordo, New Mexico area. White Sands, a physician-hospital organization, consists of Alamogordo Physicians, an independent practice association; Gerald Champion Regional Medical Center, and 31 nonphysician health care providers, including all five nurse anesthetists in the area.

The consent order permitted Valero L.P. to acquire Kaneb Services LLC and Kaneb Pipe Line Partners subject to the divestitures of assets that will preserve existing competition for petroleum transportation and terminaling in Northern California, Pennsylvania, and Colorado, and avoid a potential increase in bulk gasoline and diesel prices. The order also requires Valero to develop an information firewall and maintain open, non-discriminatory access to two retained Northern California terminals, in order to ensure access to ethanol terminaling in Northern California.

A consent order allows Occidental Chemical Company’s purchase of the chemical assets of Vulcan Materials Company, provided Occidental divests Vulcan’s Port Edwards, Wisconsin, chemical facility and related assets. The consent order alleviates the alleged anticompetitive impact of the acquisition in the markets for potassium hydroxide, anhydrous potassium carbonate (APC), and potassium carbonate, which includes APC and liquid potassium carbonate. The Port Edwards facility will be divested to ERCO Worldwide or to another Commission-approved buyer within six months if a problem is encountered with ERCO sale.