Insurance Companys Screwing Their Customers--Shocking

This letter to the Ed. from well known Atty Philip Corboy, Jr. appeared in the Chicago Tribune yesterday. The full text is worth a read.

"In their Dec. 7, 2008 commentary piece, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and Wayne Oliver of the Center for Health Transformation make an impassioned plea to promote corporate rights over the rights of individuals ("Which is more important, your doctor or a personal injury lawyer?").First, it's important to reveal the agendas of the authors of that letter. Newt Gingrich led a Republican "revolution" focused on undermining government regulations and programs, including efforts to dismantle the Medicare program that has provided health care for millions of Americans. Gingrich's efforts were bankrolled by corporate PACs and their lobbyists in Washington. His revolution ended definitively with the election of Barack Obama this past November.

Mr. Oliver's Center for Health Transformation is a for-profit group founded by the biggest insurance and pharmaceutical companies in the country. The group is advocating for laws that would radically change a fundamental premise of the legal system - the right to have a jury of your peers decide upon an outcome for a case - all in the name of increased profits for insurance companies.

Does anyone believe that the same big insurance companies that routinely deny health care coverage to patients really care about the well being of regular Americans?Apparently, they are not aware or have chosen to ignore that twice before, our state's highest court has decided in favor of patients and against the insurance companies that would limit these rights to protect their own profits. The court ruled that caps are unconstitutional and would arbitrarily fall exclusively on those most deserving of compensation - the severely injured...

Gingrich and Oliver argue that a reduction in malpractice premiums and the return of doctors to the state have resulted from the law containing caps. Nothing could be further from the truth. A look at the statistics complied and distributed by the American Medical Association clearly shows that the number of doctors in Illinois has been steadily increasing over the last 13 years. Furthermore, not one case has been litigated under the new cap in Illinois."

Read the Full Text HERE