The UnitedHealthcare headquarters in Minnetonka, Minn., lowered its flags to half-staff on Wednesday, Dec. 4, 2024, in honor of CEO Brian Thompson, who was fatally shot outside a hotel in New York. (Kerem Yücel/Minnesota Public Radio via AP)
The fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson last week has revealed a shocking reaction from the public, and it’s not anywhere near outrage at the assassination of a corporate leader.
Instead, social media was inundated with family members of patients releasing their anger, resentment and frustration at insurance companies overall, UnitedHealthcare included among many more, for an industry-wide corporate model that for all intents and purposes makes money by denying care to patients who pay for coverage but are being denied by corporate penny pinchers.
The gunman, who may just have been found after a growing trail of evidence as to how he stalked Thompson and gunned him down near a New York hotel, included the words “delay,” “deny” and “depose” on the shell casings found at the scene — all words commonly found in insurers’ denials of claims.
In reporting by The Associated Press, University of Pennsylvania researcher Michael Anne Kyle said she’s not surprised by the growth of conversation around insurers.
“People are often struggling with this by themselves, and when you see someone else talk about it, that may prompt you to join the conversation,” she said.
Kyle studies how patients access care and said she’s seen frustration with the system build for years. Costs are rising, and insurers are using more controls such as prior authorizations and doctor networks to manage them. Patients are often stuck in the middle of disputes between doctors and insurers.
“Patients are already spending a lot of money on health care, and then they’re still facing problems with the service,” she said.
And while many on social media are saying they aren’t supporting what happened to Thompson, they are saying they understand the frustration and anger that has come when a loved one dies while the family continues its appeal of a large health care corporation’s decision to deny care or coverage for a necessary treatment or medication.
At the same time the New York City police are pursuing the suspect in this case, insurance executives would be wise to “read the room” across the United States and understand just how far they have strayed from their actual mission and reason for being in business.
If your executives are being hunted down on public streets for assassination, it’s time for the insurance industry to reevaluate just where the industry’s priorities are and how customers view their behavior. And if the priority continues to be profit, instead of the patients you are insuring, the sympathy meter appears to be hovering near empty.
