Wendell Potter, the former Cigna public relations man who testified in Congress this week against the industry he long served, was interviewed by Trudy Lieberman for the Columbia Journalism Review. It’s worth reading in full.
Some excerpts:
WP: A couple of years ago I was in Tennessee and saw an ad for a health expedition in the nearby town of Wise, Virginia. Out of curiosity I went and was overwhelmed by what I saw. Hundreds of people were standing in line to get free medical care in animal stalls. Some had camped out the night before in the rain. It was like being in a different country. It moved me to tears. Shortly afterward I was flying in a corporate jet and realized someone’s insurance premiums were paying for me to fly that way. I knew it wasn’t long before I had to leave the industry. It was like my road to Damascus.
TL: What was so upsetting about the industry that pushed you over the edge?
WP: I was in a unique position to know how companies made money—what they had to do to satisfy shareholders—and how the industry has been able to kill reform in the past. I had been part of those efforts and didn’t want to be part of them again.
Referring to the insurance industry’s very successful “Harry and Louise” ads that helped sink the Clinton reform effort in 1993, Potter warns that a much subtler strategy is being employed this time around.
TL: Will we see a reprise of Harry and Louise?
WP: No. The industry knows its image is at an all-time low. So the industry can’t be as obvious in attacking a plan as it was in 1994. They will work through front groups and allies to attack it through ads and commercials.
TL: So what’s happening now with all these ads we’re seeing?
WP: What’s happening now is what happens in primary campaigns. We’re seeing a lot of targeted advertising by advocates of reform, aimed at members of Congress who might be persuaded on the wisdom of a public plan. That’s why you’re seeing a lot of advertising in Maine aimed at Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins. Later in the summer we’ll see more national advertising attacking or supporting aspects of the reform bills. It will be like a political campaign, and it will be very expensive.
TL: How should journalists be covering this middle and last phase of the campaign?
WP: They should be looking at what insurers, drug companies, and organized medicine said during earlier reform efforts, and then report on how well they’ve delivered on those promises. Instead of just reporting costs estimates from the Congressional Budget Office about how much a certain plan will cost taxpayers, which is easy to do, they should write investigative and analytical pieces on the costs to society and the economy if reform is not enacted. Is reform an expense we can’t afford, or an investment we can’t afford not to make? What is the ROI—the return on investment?
