UnitedHealthcare is increasing security after Brian Thompson's killing, executive says
Source: The Guardian
Fri 6 Dec 2024 16.50 EST
Last modified on Fri 6 Dec 2024 18.42 EST
The CEO of UnitedHealth Group, Andrew Witty, told employees he would increase security, including perimeter protection, at the companys sites following the killing of one of their colleagues, CEO of the companys health insurance branch Brian Thompson.
In comments shared with the Guardian, Witty said the company would make permanent changes that would make campuses less welcoming, but they were necessary in the countrys current climate.
We guard against the pressures that exist for unsafe or unnecessary care to be delivered, in a way that makes the whole system too complex and ultimately unsustainable, Witty said, according to comments shared with the Guardian. I have never been more proud of what this company and our colleagues do on behalf of the people in this country. I urge you to tune out the negative messaging you hear on social media, Witty said.
Witty made the comments in the face of online vitriol in response to the killing of Thompson, a 50-year-old CEO of United HealthCare, who is survived by two sons and his wife, Paulette. Thompson was killed early Wednesday morning in midtown Manhattan, just outside the site of the companys annual investor meeting, by an unknown assailant who shot the executive at least twice and then fled on an ebike.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/dec/06/united-healthcare-shooting-increased-security
gilpo
(712 posts)Think. Again.
(19,041 posts)durablend
(8,019 posts)Last edited Sat Dec 7, 2024, 11:40 AM - Edit history (2)
Watch the "feel good" campaigns start soon. " (so and so healthcare), we're looking out for YOU"
Serve your customers honestly and with compassion while compensating your execs and shareholders reasonably, and you wont need better security
Think. Again.
(19,041 posts)Gore1FL
(21,990 posts)otchmoson
(79 posts)Don't you feel healthier now?
Jacson6
(840 posts)30 years ago a school massacre inspired other people to commit more school massacres. And with members of the public supporting the murder of the UHC CEO I'm sure those that would do this would see that they could become heroes instead of villains.
Two things:
There will be those denied some potential life saving health procedure, that will figure, what the hell...... They will think of the denial as a death sentence, so what do they have to lose in taking revenge on the Health Insurance Corporations and Executives......After all, these executives and Health Insurance Corporations are basically practicing medicine without a license, and therefore are criminals.......
I predict there is gonna be a massive draining of our Special Forces, going to work in the the Corporate world, as upper executives Body guards, for tons more than the military pays them........Not just the CEO, but all top executives, officers, and Board of Directors.
I remember there were reports during W's administration that all the top egomaniacal Bush Administration all felt THEY were so important that THEY needed Secret Service protection. (None of those positions previously had ever had SS protection.) And it put a huge strain on the Secret Service's Manpower............
Emile
(30,781 posts)C0RI0LANUS
(1,862 posts)I know somebody who, if they were strapped to a polygraph machine, had his hand placed on every book of faith under the sun, and have Torquemada stare right him in the eye, will attest and swear unblinkingly and unwaveringly that AARP Medicare Advantage from United HealthCare KILLED his suffering mother.
A hospital administrator called the son on Friday at 1300 HRS to say that United Healthcare was going to stop the coverage for his terminally ill, immobile, and incontinent mother on Sunday. This gave the son less than 24 hours notice to find an affordable hospice with the weekend approaching. The costs of caring for his mother exceeded $40,000 per month and the family couldn't afford that out of pocket.
The son called UHC to make an appeal (which they recorded), but was ultimately denied. Needless to say, things did not go well for the family after that.
This family bought the smoothly-advertised package below "hook, line, and sinker" and paid the premiums (or allowed deductions to be made from their Medicare accounts) for decades.
When you visit someone elderly and you see an obscenity like this on anybody's desk, kitchen top, dining room table, or coffee table, do them a favor and throw it away forthwith. Similarly, if a ubiquitous UnitedHealthcare advertisement is airing on their TV, please change channels immediately.
Dyedinthewoolliberal
(15,944 posts)is someone like that. Lost a patent, grandparent, spouse, partner, child or similar due to a decision to place money before human life as administered by United Health Care.
C0RI0LANUS
(1,862 posts)Denzel Washington starred in a 2002 movie about his family's medical insurance carrier not paying to treat his son. In anger he takes hostages in a hospital.
jvill
(401 posts)Bengus81
(7,494 posts)TBF
(34,748 posts)they KNOW it is most likely a family member of someone they denied coverage too or they wouldn't be removing executive photos from their websites and locking down their company buildings. Duh.
Bengus81
(7,494 posts)C0RI0LANUS
(1,862 posts)Many years ago my wife and I visited a dying relative in Canada.
When we walked in the front door of the Montreal hospital, I noticed an unarmed Garda (or Securitas) security officer fighting his boredom by reading a newspaper in a tiny office. I compared that with a visit to NYC hospital where I saw something like this on my way in:
Heading towards the elevator bank of this Canadian hospital, we espied the billing department. One sleepy person was sitting at an uncluttered desk in a small office the size of a large kitchen.
Then I recalled the army of clerks at that NYC hospital working the phones, preparing bills and other paperwork. This was a frenetic mini-beehive of activity where most of the discussions I overheard regarded payments and insurance. And of course the TV was blaring.
What a difference.
orleans
(35,249 posts)C0RI0LANUS
(1,862 posts)Icanthinkformyself
(304 posts)maybe changing the vulture culture in the healthcare insurance racket. No discussion of, perhaps, reducing the expense of healthcare by limiting the millions that the executives are permitted to suck out of the system stealing it from desperate people who need care. Everything the elites do will be to protect their scam, not make necessary reforms intended to improve people's lives. The rich will not give an inch. Whatever we get from the rich must be taken from them as it will never be given by them. It has been mentioned that the next civil war will not be North/South or East/West. It will be the Morbidly Rich vs. everyone else.
NotHardly
(1,365 posts)travelingthrulife
(943 posts)Aristus
(68,617 posts)Im willing to bet that paying patient claims would cost them less than increased security across the board. Not to mention serving as an effective preventative for another dead CEO, or a workplace massacre, or, worst of all, a plunge in the stock value.
meow2u3
(24,935 posts)If it costs you dearly, it benefits them. Parasites.
Nigrum Cattus
(228 posts)jvill
(401 posts)Quanto Magnus
(1,034 posts)to raise prices more....
These are some seriously awful people.
Bengus81
(7,494 posts)Specifically HER job was to deny claims. She couldn't take it anymore and quit and testified before Congress. Said she wasn't sure how many died because of her actions.
50 Shades Of Blue
(10,907 posts)C0RI0LANUS
(1,862 posts)Nigrum Cattus
(228 posts)Healthcare $$$ should go to healthcare, period
DENVERPOPS
(10,147 posts)all the corporation would do is "Gross up" the salary of the executives to cover the expense......
orangecrush
(22,122 posts)Marthe48
(19,321 posts)I think one of my history teachers. He was making the point that if the lower classes had what they needed, the rich would benefit from that prosperity. I think the filthy rich of modern times have forgotten what happens when the majority of people don't have their needs met. Americans aren't North Koreans. We have a different culture. Lifelong obedience to a human claiming divinity isn't one of our ethics.
NotHardly
(1,365 posts)Marthe48
(19,321 posts)It'll come to a revolution but with updated weapons
I hope I'm not here for it
DENVERPOPS
(10,147 posts)If we are gonna have anarchy, which is far worse than a civil war, I certainly don't need that in my final years.......
LOL, Someone said: "You better stock up on ammunition".......I laughed and said: "All I need are three bullets, one for me, one for my wife, and one for my dog"........(and maybe a fourth for the Karen MAGA in our neighborhood.....LOL)........
Anyone interested, re-read Steinbeck's Award Winning book: The Grapes of Wrath............It will frighten you, or should......
Marthe48
(19,321 posts)including Grapes of Wrath. I was never that poor, never want to be.
When people think about the good old days, they don't think about that level of poverty across the world. If rwnj get their way, that level of poverty will return to this country and pull down many people whose parents and grandparents worked themselves to death to make life better for the next generations. And, being aware of American poor already trying to make it through a day, there will be countless more victims tipped closer to the bottom.
DENVERPOPS
(10,147 posts)that they are driving full steam ahead to going back to the days of the "Robber Barrons" and the Gilded Age........
The only thing that saved the nation from them was FDR, who the Republicans LOATHED.
This group of "New" so called RepubliCONs is hell bent on wiping out all the regulatory agencies and protections that FDR put in place, making it an easy path to return to the days of old, with a whole new set of Modern Day Robber Barrons.
My only consolation is that all the MAGAot voters will ALL get creamed, in addition to all of us, due to their ignorance and outright stupidity. In the final days of Trump's rallies, he openly told them to vote for him ONE last time, and they would never need to vote again, and they were all so stupid to realize what he meant by that..........
Did you know that when the Grapes of Wrath was first published, it was banned in the United States???????
Marthe48
(19,321 posts)But the people who hate migrant workers should read it.
IbogaProject
(3,776 posts)The wealthy spend cautiously and slowly and often not in the general community. They buy art and luxury products from each other, including tertiary residences. Where as a grandmother in a housing project spends her monthly income quickly, carefully and often locally. We can see what has happened in the 40 some years since Reagan got the tax code shifted, the middle class standard of living hasn't increased. The statistics play games by trying to factor some improvements like faster computers and larger TV screens as having an economic benefit but those don't amount to more food on the table.
yaesu
(8,356 posts)Irish_Dem
(59,689 posts)JustABozoOnThisBus
(23,825 posts)Maybe buy up all the Sharpies, so people won't write our company mission statement on bullets.
Irish_Dem
(59,689 posts)The CEOs will be rolling in more dough.
Irish_Dem
(59,689 posts)The rich won't pay for it themselves.
dobleremolque
(919 posts)we should provide a little more care and make a little less money." Only government intervention and regulation will bring that about.
Karasu
(368 posts)very existence.
And we're sure as hell not getting universal healthcare under fascism.
orleans
(35,249 posts)or your coverage will be going down
they might even kill off those incentives: the gym membership, the rides to doctors they don't approve, the $100 grocery card, and the fucking pony they promised you'd get on your next birthday
Evolve Dammit
(19,056 posts)Deminpenn
(16,347 posts)Even the internet sleuths aren't interested in trying to find the killer.
I suppose too many Americans have had bad experiences navigationg the health insurance companies vs health care providers maze.