Health Insurers Care More About Money

Why was “State Fines HMO $500,000 in Case of Girl With Cancer” (Nov. 18) in the business section? It should have been on the front page, where every reader would be sure to see it.

Commissioner Gary S. Mendosa of the California Department of Corporations called the TakeCare HMO case “particularly egregious” and said the insurer’s actions “put the patient’s life in jeopardy.”

The HMO refused to cover the $57,000 medical expenses for the surgery and services that saved this child’s life. Yet earlier this year, when TakeCare was acquired by FHP, a Fountain Valley-based HMO, their CEOs and other corporate executives awarded themselves millions of dollars as a reward for accomplishing the acquisition.

At that time, when admonished by the corporations commissioner, a financial representative called those millions of dollars “chump change.”

Count how many life-saving surgeries could be paid for with those millions of dollars in “chump change.” The “chumps” are the care-givers and the patients.

The article concluded with a quote from Consumers Union’s Judith Bell, who said: “There are plenty of complaints, but consumers either don’t know they can file with the Department of Corporations or they don’t think the agency will do something.”

This is another example of the fact that while care-givers care about patients, insurance companies care only about profits.

MELVIN H. KIRSCHNER, M.D.

Van Nuys