The cold-blooded murder of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson has become, to many, an opportunity to vent about their insurance nightmares.
After her mother was diagnosed with stage-four breast cancer, Anna watched for years as she fought both the illness and the health-care system until her death in 2020. “The fight with the insurance companies was, in many ways, worse than cancer,” Anna says. “It took over my entire family’s life.”
She recalls her mother’s time-consuming struggles to get new treatments approved. “It was just so maddening to know they were shaving years off my mom’s life because of the paperwork,” Anna recalls.
So on Wednesday morning when she heard the news that UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was shot dead in Manhattan, she had a perverse reaction.
“I am ashamed to admit it, but there was a little surge of Schadenfreude,” says Anna, who, like several others in this story, asked to use a pseudonym to protect her privacy.
She was far from alone. Across the internet and on social media, countless people expressed grim satisfaction or even glee at the murder of 50-year-old Thompson, who is survived by a wife and two sons. Authorities say he was killed in a targeted attack. Bullet casings recovered by police were inscribed with the words deny, defend, and depose, apparent references to how insurance companies deal with patient claims.
“Today, we mourn the death of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, gunned down…. wait, I’m sorry — today we mourn the deaths of the 68,000 Americans who needlessly die each year so that insurance company execs like Brian Thompson can become multimillionaires,” one popular post on X read.
