Former BlueCross Pitchman Switches Sides, Comes Out For Public Option

Andy Cobb has had enough. A former pitchman for BlueCross Blue Shield of Florida, Cobb is breaking with the firm and speaking out in favor of health care reform and a public health insurance option.

"This is the time when Americans have to choose which side we're on," Cobb told HuffPost, quoting Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio). "Is it the insurance companies or the American people?"

Cobb calls on what he dubs his fellow "spokes-jerks" -- singling out the FreeCreditReport.com guy -- to stop hawking products that hurt the American people.

Cobb teamed with Brave New Films to create the short video.

"I do know that 19 percent of every dollar of our premiums goes to administrative costs, for executive compensation and people like me. We can't afford people like me any more in this country," he said.

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Comments

[OffTheLows]

it seems to be a pretty lucrative business to be a former health insurance industry employee coming out in favor of a public option. He never mentions the meager profit margins of the industry (ie. 5-6% pre-tax), nor what he believes will be the administrative costs for the government, which on a per capita basis are already higher for medicare than private insurance - even though they don't collect monthly premiums on graduated scales or have nearly the complexity involved. Nor has the government provided any indication they know how to correctly price risk and be as adept at rooting out fraud as the private sector, and do it when there may be pain involved w/ their public option policyholders.

[ScarlettGA]

To be honest, this is the only the second former health insurance industry employee I've ever heard of speaking out in this way. Wendell Potter, a former CIGNA employee, has gained a good bit of notariety speaking out for the public option. I'm not sure if he's on anyone's payroll, but it's obvious which side of the debate has the most money to get their message out.

With that being said, their profit margins are anything but meager. A show called "Fault Lines" (on Al Jazeera English) aired a piece on health care reform back in August. You can still find it on YouTube, and I think all opponents to health care reform should have a look at it. Not only has the health care insurance industry seen their profits explode by 400% in recent years, according to the show, but members of Congress, including the Blue Dog Democrats, have also benefited from health care sector profits.

I can understand people having misgivings about the government handling health care, but the status quo needs to change. There are also other countries where the government handles health (alongside the private sector in many cases) and it works well for all involved. If the private sector was serious about making those changes, they've given little evidence of wanting to or planning to make them.

[antmousie]

Any day someone sees the light is a good day. Keep the floodgates open for all the others.

[NICELYDONE]

Roe of Roe v Wade is pro life ,,, against the termination of unborn children,,,, A Planned Parenthood VP just resigned and exposed the quota system... Your point is ?

[Kassandra]

I think you're on the wrong thread or can't your one track mind deal with a change of topic?

[TequilaMockingbird]

I am against the starvation and societal neglect of Born Children.. What's your point.?

[luckynewman13]

love the fetus, hate the child, right?

you can't be pro-life and against universal, affordable health care...sorry

[bliss0027]

uhhh still trying to figure out your point

[DeniseD]

Maybe Andy should work at MSNBC. How about a commentator on the Daily Show? He is pretty funny.

[DredLockRasta]

If you build it, they will come.

[jellinda]

OPHTHALMOLOGY HERE- One of our patients was considering eye surgery, who also happens to work for Blue Cross/Blue Shield of California! I was telling him that hopefully his coverage would extend to his needed procedure, but since he had BCBS I didn't know. He said," What do you mean? Oh, you mean, denying claims and canceling policies? Yeah we did that, but we've been told not to do that anymore." People: BCBS is notorious for this, and we have the say-so straight from one of their own employees. They are trying to whitewash what they do and we would be foolish to think it's not being done elsewhere, or that they won't try it again ONCE THE BAD PRESS HAS GONE AWAY.

[blueken]

More and more people are defecting from the evil empire. The problem becomes, are the right people listening? The CEO of United Health Care makes $34,000 per HOUR. Because of predatory policies towards it's insured, they can not do business in Minn. where there corporate headquarters are. All insurance companies do is pay bills, I thing the government can handle that, without obscene profits.

[johnsopinion]

Just wondering, of those that has been turned down for
some operation or treatment, are any of them also stock
holders in the company that turned them down?

[TeeLolly]

All the insurance companies do is figure out ways NOT to pay bills ...

[Jupitersky]

Yeah, they don't make money by paying them. They make money by denying people who PAID premiums.

One of the strategies I am familiar with goes like this- delay, deny, and hope they don't appeal. Keep in mind that insurance companies profits are soley generated on premiums. When they received premiums that money goes into an account and they are required to hold a certain percentage as reserves to pay claim. The common percentage is 60%. So they can take the 40% and invest that money on the market or in other schemes to boost their bottom lines. If they delay making payment the can accrue more interest. So if you have 50000 claims in a year and you delay payment on them all by 3-4 weeks you can make a lot of money in interest. Additionally if you tend to deny more people it takes work for them to appeal. Certainly some of them will not appeal meaning the insurance company make more money.

[matthewbenzor]

The re-publican healthcare plan= Hurry and die because its cheaper to bury than to take care of you....! it has a little ring to it does'nt it.........! so go ahead buy the re-publican healthcare plan there waiting for you and have a casket with your name on it.....

[rtb61]

No matter the size of the pay packet, it must be pretty hard to accept when 47,000 people per year have to do to pay for it. Of course for all those that finally realise that it is not worth it, there are worthless disgusting individuals who don't can't how many have to die as long as they can profit by it.

[BunnyX]

You need to take into account that this is FLORIDA, folks. Florida can turn anything into crap, and corruption and excessive greed are just their standard way of doing business. The BCBS in my state, however, is a not-for-profit - and they do it right, fair and honest and pretty darn quick. Sadly, there aren't very many of the not-for-profit BCBS left, and we are lucky to have one.

[miriamfl]

Bunny, I also live in FL and have BCBS and so far so good, however the proble is not just the insurance co. it's how one has insurance. My husband has a good job with benefits but he also has cancer for the past 6years and because it's a treatable cancer and he hasn't taken time off work it has been ok. But what if he becomes extremely ill and has to take off work for long priods of time and then loses his job, how on earth is he going to get insurance again? If you don't work you can't afford insurance and if you have a pre-existing condition you can't afford ins. I would love to have a medicare type plan for all and if we had that we could improve it. With all the money we pay insurance companies we could have a great public plan but I am realistic it's not going to happen.

[punkindmb]

If your husband switches jobs he might be in trouble as well. I don't understand why your husbands situation isn't getting more traction. The congress has to know that there are more people like your husband than not. And can you imagine your life without having to worry about his coverage?

[BunnyX]

I'm not saying a public option wouldn't be a good thing - I think it would be a great thing, especially for people in your shoes. But I'm also saying that just because BCBS Florida sucks (according to the guy this article is about), it doesn't mean that every BCBS in every other state is bad too. They are not all the same.

[TequilaMockingbird]

I wish people would lose the mind set that Insurance has anything at all to do with the Delivery of HC.

Even if it is great.. Health insurance is still unnecessary.

[sheaintsayin]

I'm late to your party, but I want in cause you are absolutely, positively correct! Fanned!

[FogBelter]

Something people probably rarely think about anymore ... all of those beautiful, congenial, smiling people that invite themselves into your life through advertising are being compensated to pitch their crap ...

Yes, even those perversely happy Viagra couples ...

[jpayne30]

It's one of the WaPo guys!

[sheaintsayin]

Love it! Thanks Mr. Cobb, especially for calling out all the cohorts; priceless!

[healthcare4all]

I'm amazed at the many long-winded attacks this page against someone who had the g(n)uts to say he made a mistake - something we all do every day except of course repubs, teabaga and fruitcakes who put insurance companies before me, their kids and family, and We the People.

[bryanphoto]

I was recently out to lunch with an old high school friend. He has been in the insurance game for 9 years. He bragged about how he works, at most, 2 hours a day and makes 400k a year. He bragged about his antique muscle cars. He bragged about his 5000 square foot house being too big for just one person and he was going to move to a 3500 square foot house to "pair down". And he is one of the "little guys" in the industry. This is what makes me sick about for-profit health care and, it is indicative of the "anything for a buck" attitude in this country. Health care and energy should be for the benefit of mankind, not a hindrance.

[BunnyX]

A) I agree with you, exploiting the sick to make money is just evil.
B) Insurance is NOT health care. People need to stop conflating them.
C) Health care should be the partly a calling - a way to help humanity. However, the extreme and excessive profits in large sections of the health care industry (notable pharmaceutical companies) are what is causing the price of insurance to skyrocket. Control the costs, put in a public option, and the problem will solve itself.