The Spark

the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist

“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx

The Pandemic Has Been a Bonanza for Health Insurers

Aug 24, 2020

Kaiser Permanente reported a 2.1-billion dollar operating profit from its health insurance business in the second quarter of 2020—almost twice as much as the same period last year.

The reason for the huge jump in Kaiser’s profit is that, with its hospitals cancelling elective surgeries and other procedures in the first months of the pandemic, Kaiser did not pay for such medical claims—while it continued to collect premiums from its customers.

Kaiser, which doesn’t pay taxes thanks to its supposedly “non-profit” status, will add this to a war chest of over $30 billion in reserves!

The same thing happened at the other big health insurance companies. Second-quarter profits of three of the biggest for-profit insurers in the U.S., Anthem, UnitedHealth and Humana, added up to $10.7 billion—more than double their combined profits of $5.3 billion in the second quarter of 2019.

For the bosses who run these insurance companies, health care is just an excuse to grab money. For them, the pandemic, with all of its death and suffering, is a bonanza!