5 hours Ago
“T he ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth.
Through violence you murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. ..
. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” —The Rev. Dr.
Martin Luther King Jr. Rob Kent, JD, is president of Kent Strategic Advisors, LLC. I have seen recent social media posts that seem to condone the killing of the UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
I consider myself a fierce advocate and I have fought with UHC and other insurers as a government regulator and in my private legal practice. UHC and many of its colleagues systematically deny folks access to medically necessary treatment, they stop covering such treatment far too soon and their practices have caused deaths. Families in New York State who lost loved one because of the practices of UHC and other insurers used their anger and mobilized to lead our efforts to change the laws.
With their support, we ended prior authorization, limited continued stay reviews, and created our own medical necessity tool for substance use treatment services. These families never talked about fighting the insurer practices by murdering their leaders. This should also be a clear message to the federal government that their failure to stop UHC’s practices contributes to the frustration of many against UHC and other insurance companies.
They need to enforce the laws and change those that are not working. We have a federal mental health and addiction insurance parity law that seems to be nothing more than words. Further, the laws we changed in New York do not apply to more than half of the insurance policies in that state as they are protected by federal law.
Congress needs to fix this. If you believe that it was karma or that there was some justification to take Thompson’s life, I hope you find peace. I will never find what happened to be OK.
The reaction of some to this murder is no different than the reactions of others to events where violence was used against those that they disagreed with. Channeling your anger to advocacy can work. It did in New York.
Rob Kent, JD, is president of Kent Strategic Advisors, LLC. Catch the latest in Opinion Get opinion pieces, letters and editorials sent directly to your inbox weekly!.
