Cyber Attack on Change Healthcare Causes Chaos and Outages at Pharmacies 

A cybercriminal group called “Blackcat” targeted Change Healthcare information technology systems last week. Change Healthcare is owned by United Healthcare and is used to check patients’ eligibility for medication and treatments based on their insurance plans. 

The breach happened on Feb 21.  Many of Change Healthcare’s systems are still down and may be impacted for weeks.  

Although United Healthcare claims that most of the nation’s pharmacies have set up electronic workarounds, the system outages continue to disrupt pharmacy and health system operations across the country. 

Key Issues

• The outage makes routine processes difficult, such as running claims through insurance and receiving electronic prescriptions and patients getting necessary medications. 
• United Healthcare says that 90% of the pharmacies affected have developed workaround processes to manage the situation.
• Healthcare cyberattacks have been on the rise in recent years.

Patient Care at Risk

In addition to filling prescriptions, the outage makes it difficult to confirm eligibility for treatments. 

Reimbursements to providers have also been delayed, making it difficult for smaller offices to cover expenses like payroll and medical supplies. 

Healthcare Exposed and Unprotected

The bigger issue is the rising number of healthcare cyberattacks and the vulnerability of our healthcare systems. 

In 2023, there were 725 large healthcare security breaches up from the record 720 the previous year, according to a January report from The HIPAA Journal.

Currently, a serious ransomware attack is launched against a U.S. health care provider approximately every other week.

Types of Cyberattacks

Personal data may be exposed through these attacks. Bad actors can easily sell health data on the dark web leading to other crimes such as identity theft and healthcare fraud, according to John Riggi, national advisor for cybersecurity and risk at the American Hospital Association (AHA.) 

As technology evolves, ransomware attacks will become more sophisticated and powerful in trying to shut down medical technology in hospitals and health systems.  

These disruptions can lead to delays in services that could risk patient safety. 

“They come in and encrypt all the data in networks, so that suddenly, immediately, systems go dark, they become unavailable,” Riggi explained. This means diagnostic technologies like CT scanners can go offline, and ambulances carrying patients are often diverted, which can delay lifesaving care.

Under Investigation

UnitedHealth has not yet disclosed the nature of the attack on Change Healthcare.

Change Healthcare in 2022 merged with Optum (A United Healthcare unit), which is a major provider of services in technology, data, pharmacy care and direct health care.  

Cyberattacks may carry serious repercussions across the wider health care field.

Keeping Safe Online

“Health care is a complex industry with lots of moving pieces and entry points, which means it can be hard for any organization to be 100% secure,” said Cliff Steinhauer, director of information security and engagement at the National Cybersecurity Alliance. 

Even so, he said there are steps individuals can take to help keep their personal data safe:

• keep software updated,
• set up multifactor authentication,
• use strong, unique passwords. 

“We all have a job to keep ourselves safe online,” Steinhauer reminds us.

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