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Connecticut Attorney General to Investigate Insurance Company Abuses
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The state of Connecticut has asked six leading insurance companies—Aetna, ConnectiCare, HealthNet, Anthem, United Health Group and WellCare—to fully disclose what they’re telling their members about health care reform.
The request comes after Humana, another insurance provider, was caught providing misleading and scare-mongering information to Medicare Advantage and Medicare Part D customers about the future effects of health care reform legislation.
The investigation follows a call by AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka for more accountability for insurance companies and a serious examination of whether these companies’ political activity and lobbying are a contributor to skyrocketing rates and rising costs for consumers.
In recent days, Trumka sent a letter to Connecticut’s insurance commissioner, Thomas Sullivan, asking him to investigate the impact of health insurance companies’ lobbying expenditures on health insurance premiums and adopt regulations to prevent lobbying costs from being transferred to consumers through excessive rate increases.
Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal announced this morning that he and state Healthcare Advocate Kevin Lembo demanded to see all marketing materials, Web content and other documents provided to customers that reference health care reform and Medicare. Here’s what Blumenthal and Lembo said in a letter sent today to insurance company CEOs:
Policyholders deserve clear and complete information about their Medicare benefits under existing law as well as under any proposed changes contained in federal health care reform proposals. We intend to review these documents to ensure that the information provided to policyholders is accurate and does not mislead consumers.
John Olsen of the Connecticut AFL-CIO joined Blumenthal at the announcement.
Insurance companies and their allies have used scare tactics and falsehoods as tactics to defeat health care reform, targeting seniors in particular, even though real health care reform will help protect retirees and strengthen Medicare.
Cal Bunnell, president of the Connecticut Alliance for Retired Americans, praised Blumenthal for demanding accountability from insurance companies:
Connecticut retirees applaud Attorney General Richard Blumenthal’s bold and decisive action today to stop deceptive scare tactics aimed at senior citizens. The recent revelations of fear-mongering mailings by Humana, Inc. make it more important than ever to be vigilant in protecting the public interest.
During these difficult economic times—and at such a critical juncture in the health insurance reform debate—seniors must be able to trust the information they receive. Humana’s recent actions fail to meet that standard.
You can contact your insurance company to demand accountability here.
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2 Comments
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It’s good to see Trumka taking a stand and working to expose insurance companies’ fraud and abuse. Now let’s get busy with a national campaign to pass HR 676 and the Sanders bill to establish real universal health care through a single payer system. Obama’s plan will force us into HMOs that do not provide health care and that continue to deny care and pay outrageous CEO compensation. Only a government administered plan, Medicare for All, will cover everyone and cut costs.
The guys who write the stories for this blog must think we are morons. Of course the insurance companies lie just as does Obama, Biden, Pelosi, McConnell, Reid, and the entire pack of jackels in Congress. They are supporting the needs of capital and with the so-called “reform” being crafted in Congress today we will all be screwed except the insurance companies, health providers and pharmacutical houses. Congress is responsible to them.
We, the working class and poor, will get health care for all when we smash this present murderous system and build our own government that will provide FREE medical care for all because we will no longer be funneling off OUR produced wealth to a pack of parisites. This will take leadership and a fight of mammoth proportions and that people like Trumka will do all they can to inpead. There job as “labor statesmen” is to act like “mature” representatives of the masses whereas, in fact, they speak for the most conservative and sometimes most reactinary workers in this country saddling up next to the bosses to prove their loyality to the capitalist system. Hell they would rather lead a prayer vigil then a militant struggle for health care for all.