Steve Nelson brings decades of health insurance and managed care leadership to his relatively new role as president of Hartford health insurer Aetna, a subsidiary of CVS Health.
He officially took the reins in early November 2024.
Nelson’s career is marked by senior leadership roles across several major healthcare and insurance organizations. He formerly served as CEO of UnitedHealthcare, and later led ChenMed, a provider group focused on value-based primary care.
Earlier in his career, he held leadership positions at the Henry Ford Health System.
His appointment comes at a pivotal time for Aetna: the insurer last year faced mounting cost pressures, especially in its Medicare business, and its parent company, CVS Health, has shuffled top leadership amid an ongoing turnaround effort.
Nelson is expected to leverage his operational and strategic experience to restore profitability, tighten cost controls, and deepen integration between insurance and care delivery under the broader CVS ecosystem.
So far, the results have been positive. While CVS Health reported an overall loss in the third quarter of 2025, its Aetna division reported a $314 million operating profit, reversing a $924 million loss in the year-ago period.