I don’t think it is news that the health care industry had a plan to discredit Michael Moore’s documentary film, Sicko. Or that they seek to demonize “government run” health care. That’s simply and self-evidently true.
But it is news when an industry executive who was charged with that demonization as head of corporate communications for CIGNA goes On Bill Moyers Journal to discuss it. Wendell Potter had “the ultimate PR job.” He’s changed his tune:
WENDELL POTTER: The industry has always tried to make Americans think that government-run systems are the worst thing that could possibly happen to them, that if you even consider that, you’re heading down on the slippery slope towards socialism. So they have used scare tactics for years and years and years, to keep that from happening. If there were a broader program like our Medicare program, it could potentially reduce the profits of these big companies. So that is their biggest concern.
On Michael Moore’s Sicko:
WENDELL POTTER: I thought that he hit the nail on the head with his movie. But the industry, from the moment that the industry learned that Michael Moore was taking on the health care industry, it was really concerned. […]
BILL MOYERS: Was it true? Did you think it contained a great truth?
WENDELL POTTER: Absolutely did.
BILL MOYERS: What was it?
WENDELL POTTER: That we shouldn’t fear government involvement in our health care system. That there is an appropriate role for government, and it’s been proven in the countries that were in that movie.
You know, we have more people who are uninsured in this country than the entire population of Canada. And that if you include the people who are underinsured, more people than in the United Kingdom. We have huge numbers of people who are also just a lay-off away from joining the ranks of the uninsured, or being purged by their insurance company, and winding up there.
And another thing is that the advocates of reform or the opponents of reform are those who are saying that we need to be careful about what we do here, because we don’t want the government to take away your choice of a health plan. It’s more likely that your employer and your insurer is going to switch you from a plan that you’re in now to one that you don’t want. You might be in the plan you like now.
But chances are, pretty soon, you’re going to be enrolled in one of these high deductible plans in which you’re going to find that much more of the cost is being shifted to you than you ever imagined.
In part 1 of the interview, Potter talks about the conversion experience on a visit to Wise, VA, that caused him to leave:
I saw…doctors who were set up to provide care in animal stalls. Or they’d erected tents, to care for people. I mean, there was no privacy. In some cases– and I’ve got some pictures of people being treated on gurneys, on rain-soaked pavement.
Significantly, for all of those 15 years at CIGNA, Potter believed he was doing the right and honorable thing. I don’t doubt that all those health care activists and lobbyist’s on the Hill today believe that, too.
A note to my friends in comments who will no doubt point to this Newsbusters piece for what they call “truth and balance:” don’t just point there. Explain to me how it matters that a high level PR flack for the health care industry leaving a lucrative position to make far less money as a senior fellow on health care for the non-profit Center for Media and Democracy changes anything about what he has to say.