Stop the Pain
Artist Unknown
Offset, 2007
United States
43638
The deadly state of American health care is again in the spotlight following the December 4th slaying of UnitedHealth CEO Brian Thompson. Luigi Mangione, the lead suspect, was arrested Monday after a five-day nationwide search.
Instead of engendering public sympathy, the assassination has sparked public discourse revealing Americans’ anger toward health insurance companies. UnitedHealth’s profit-over-people practices were scrutinized immediately after the slaying.
Critics spotlighted how UnitedHealth adopted AI technology that had a 90% error rate in evaluating claims that were deemed by doctors to be medically necessary.
Nearly everyone in the U.S. has been impacted by denied medical insurance claims, large hospital bills, and an increasing lack of access to affordable and quality care.
Despite health insurance companies being billion dollar industries, U.S. residents owe at least $220 billion in medical debt even though over 90% of Americans have health insurance. Among similarly wealthy countries, the U.S. has the lowest life expectancy, caused in part by patients skipping medical tests, appointments, or prescription medication due to each of these being cost-prohibitive.
Murder is never justifiable, and one CEO cannot be held responsible for the cruel practices of an industry that profits off of people’s illnesses, disabilities, and deaths. However, the public's largely unsympathetic attitude toward Thompson’s killing, indicates that almost no one, no matter their politics, is happy with the status quo.
CSPG’s Poster of the Week illustrates the ever-increasing cost of necessary medical care, and demands change. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010 was the largest step taken in decades to combat issues such as people being chronically uninsured or denied insurance due to pre-existing conditions. Over a decade later, the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 lowered prescription drug prices.
Yet even with these improvements, the American health care industry as a whole has a disapproval rating of 51%. Between Robert F. Kennedy’s anti-vaccine stance and Dr. Mehmet Oz’s health advice not backed by science, the state of health care in the U.S. is likely to get even worse with Trump’s new administration. Moreover, the Republican hostility towards birth control and abortions blatantly ignores the nearly two-thirds of Americans who believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases.
Health care is a human right. We must fight to strengthen it.
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