HEALTH CARE FOR AMERICA NOW
NEW YORK CITY ORGANIZING COMMITTEE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 22, 2009

Statement at “BIG Insurance: Sick of It!”
Outside the NYC Offices of United Health Care
One Penn Plaza in Manhattan

Good afternoon.  My name is Mark Hannay, and I am Director of the Metro New York Health Care for All Campaign, a citywide coalition of community groups and labor unions that have been fighting for universal health care since 1993.  We are also a member of the Steering Committee of our statewide coalition, Health Care for All New York, and we help lead Health Care for America Now’s New York City Organizing Committee and serve on its New York State Steering Committee.

Thank you for being here today.  I bring you greetings from Health Care for America Now, a national coalition of over 1,000 national, state, and local organizations and trade unions who have joined together to fight for REAL health care reform in 2009, and for a strong public health insurance option to be included in health care reform legislation. It’s long past time for our nation to join every other industrialized democracy in the world to guarantee comprehensive, quality, affordable health care to all, and we’re going to make it happen THIS YEAR.

We’re here today to join with thousands of Americans to say “BIG Insurance – We’re Sick of It!”  Our protest here today against United Healthcare is one of 5 demonstrations happening outside insurance company offices across New York in Buffalo, Binghamton, Albany, and on Long Island.  And we are one of scores of protests happening all across America today against BIG Insurance.

We are here today to call on our lawmakers to stop listening to BIG Insurance. We call on them to listen instead to the vast majority of New Yorkers and Americans who want REAL health care reform. We want it done this year, and we demand a strong public health insurance option in any health care reform bill coming out of Congress.

We’ve had enough of BIG Insurance, we don’t want it anymore, and we want the choice of a way out, a public option.  We’re here to proclaim, “Hasta la vista, baby!” to United Healthcare and BIG Insurance.

Have you had enough of BIG Insurance?  So have I.

Today we’re standing outside United Healthcare’s NYC offices, located across the street at One Penn Plaza, directly above Penn Station and adjacent to Madison Square Garden.  Let me tell you a little bit about United Healthcare’s record here in New York, based on a report released today by the Public Policy and Education Fund of New York:

According to their analysis based on data from the New York State Department of Health and the New York State Insurance Department, United Healthcare has one of the worst consumer service records of any health insurer in the state. 

• Based on complaints lodged with and upheld by the NY State Insurance Dept., filed by consumers and health care providers, United Healthcare has the third worst ranking of any of the 46 health insurers in the state.  The complaints concerned such topics as failure to provide coverage and promised benefits, charging excessive rates and premiums, and failure to payments to doctors and hospitals.

• United Healthcare is ranked 44 out the 46 insurers in all categories of health insurers by the NY State Insurance Dept., and it has the worst complaint record (#29 out of 29) of all commercial, for-profit insurers.

• In 2008, there were 559 complaints upheld against United Healthcare by the NY State Insurance Dept.  By comparison, Aetna had only 200 complaints upheld.

• In 2006, after years of findings of improper business practices that remained uncorrected, the NY State Department of Health took the rare step of banning United Healthcare’s managed care plan from enrolling most types of new customers.

• In 2007, United Healthcare agreed to a $4 million settlement with the NY State Insurance Dept. that included a three-year improvement plan to eliminate the company’s errors in claims processing. This was the largest settlement ever entered into with a health insurer involving practices that had harmed consumers.

• In 2008, the NY Attorney General’s office reached a nationwide $50 million settlement with United Health Group. The investigation concerned the company’s subsidiary, Ingenix, Inc., which United Healthcare and other large insurers use to determine billing rates for out-of-network services. Attorney General Cuomo found that Ingenix had intentionally set the billing rates at a lower level than market rates.  This was an obvious conflict of interest that resulted in United Healthcare paying doctors and hospitals hundreds of millions less than the market price they were owed.  This fraudulent scheme resulted in consumers being charged hundreds of millions of dollars more than they should have paid.

I also want to tell you a bit about how United Healthcare is working to stop REAL health care reform legislation in Congress:

• At least some of those people expressing opposition to health care reform this past summer at Congressional Town Meetings were insurance company employees, a portion of which were influenced and even intimidated into taking action by their employer. Several media outlets reported that United Health Group sent a letter to its employees on company stationery asking them to attend town hall meetings and to write letters and make phone calls to Congress.  The company gave them anti-reform talking points to use.

• United Health Group’s use of company funds and its employees to defeat health care reform may be illegal, at least in one state.  On September 2nd, the advocacy group Consumer Watchdog sent a letter to California Attorney General arguing that United Healthcare’s actions violated a provision of California law prohibiting companies from controlling or directing the “political activities of employees.

In closing, let me invite all of you to join with all of us in Health Care for America Now, MoveOn, and our allies here today to blunt the inordinate influence of BIG Insurance on Congress.  Otherwise, we'll get health care reform BIG Insurance-style.  That would be a true nightmare and something NONE of us wants.

Together, we can make history.  We CAN win REAL health care reform, including a strong public option, this year, but ONLY if each one of us takes action.  We urge everyone to call Senator Schumer and Senator Gillibrand and your own member of Congress every week from now until a final bill passes.  Tell them to “stop listening to BIG Insurance, and give us the choice of a strong public health insurance option.”

Thank you for being here.  Now, let’s get to it!

Metro New York Health Care for All - 40 Worth Street, Suite 802, New York, NY 10013 - Phone: 212-925-1829