Secretary Sebelius Takes on Health Insurance CEOs
Earlier today, Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius stopped by a gathering of health insurance executives in Washington to speak directly to the CEOs who have been fighting tooth and nail to block reform.
On Monday, insurance company executives came to D.C. to begin their week-long conference of America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), the lobbying arm of the nation's health insurance industry. While they've been in Washington, we learned that health insurance rates in Illinois are going up by as much as 60 percent. We learned that Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield -- the company we’ve been hearing about due to their exorbitant rate hikes in California -- is raising rates for Virginians as well. And we learned that as insurers raise rates for consumers, AHIP is spending $1 million dollars on an ad blitz to try and block the President's plan for reform.
At the insurers conference today, Secretary Kathleen Sebelius asked the CEOs to think about the frustration felt by families and small businesses in today’s broken health care system:
"When Americans have so few choices, can you blame them for being frustrated when their premiums go up ten times faster than the cost of health care? Imagine how folks in Illinois might feel after opening the newspaper to see that profits for major insurance companies went up 56 percent last year only to get a letter the next day saying their premiums are going up by double digits? Can you blame them for thinking the system’s broken when their health insurance – which is supposed to protect them from exorbitant health costs – still forces them to pay thousands of dollars out of their pocket each year?
I wanted to come talk to you today because I believe any conversation about how to fix our health insurance system has to start with asking how we can put these families and small business owners who feel so powerless in today’s health care markets back in control of their health care.”
She then challenged them to either continue their opposition to reform or work to help strengthen the President’s plan and help consumers:
"You can choose to continue your opposition to reform. If you do and reform goes down in defeat, we know what will happen. By next March, premiums will be taking an even bigger bite out of Americans’ wages. More Americans will lose the security of employer-sponsored insurance. More small businesses will be forced to shut down or cancel their employees’ coverage. Parents and children with preexisting conditions will continue to be shut out of the insurance market. And Americans will continue to live in fear of the next letter from their insurer announcing the latest premium hike.
...Then there is your other choice.
You can choose to take the millions of dollars you have stored away for your next round of ads to kill meaningful reform, and use them to start giving Americans some relief from their skyrocketing premiums. Instead of spending your energy attacking the parts of the President’s proposal you don’t like, you can use it to strengthen the parts you do.
If you take this approach, you may give up some short-term profits. But you will also be helping to create a sustainable health insurance market where all Americans will be able to buy coverage. That’s better for the American people. And it could be better for insurance companies too.”
Secretary Sebelius has been working to hold insurance companies accountable for their actions that hurt consumers while boosting their own profits. Following a meeting with insurance executives at the White House last week, Secretary Sebelius wrote a letter asking them to publicly justify their exorbitant premium increases.
