WellPoint shares dropped almost 9% to $53.80 as investors dread a blow to revenue growth. The losses came two days subsequent to the company’s declaration of a 51% hike in first-quarter profits.

While Aetna and Cigna were down 5%, UnitedHealth and Humana 3%.

On Friday, Healthcare stocks slid as Wall Street expected more bad news ahead for the country's big insurance firms after major insurer WellPoint Inc. suddenly annulled an enormous rate hike in California.

Investors are apprehensive that Indianapolis-based WellPoint's choice to cancel plans for rate increases as high as 39% among pressure from State Officers could be an indication of things to come somewhere else.

Steven Shubitz, a Healthcare Analyst with Edward Jones in St. Louis, said, "People are thinking, if this is happening in California, it might start happening in other states. If that happens, profit growth could be seriously impacted".

WellPoint division Anthem Blue Cross pulled out rate hikes for several of its 800,000 California consumers with individual policies on Thursday, after a state consultant discovered that it had exaggerated future medical costs used to justify the higher premiums.

State Officers said that Anthem's rate application was full of methodological faults, which raised the rates.