Anthem Blue Cross Slashing Missouri Workforce

Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in Missouri is cutting about 40 percent of its work force in Cape Girardeau, which will leave 125 workers jobless, and another 11 employees in Springfield.

Additionally, health insurer WellPoint, the parent company of Anthem, is laying off 139 workers in Worthington, Ohio. The catalyst for the layoffs is WellPoint’s declining membership, which fell 4 percent to 34 million members last year, the St. Louis Business Journal reports.

The majority of the Anthem Missouri workers that will be affected handle calls from providers—work that will now be outsourced to APAC Customer Service Inc., which is based in Illinois. The remainder of the employees work in claims. Those operations will be moved to WellPoint’s headquarters in Indianapolis.

The layoffs are slated to begin in June and continue through November.

According to the Business Journal, WellPoint has 40,000 employees, including more than 1,570 in Missouri.