NEW YORK (AP) — Brian Thompson led one of many largest well being insurers within the U.S. however was unknown to tens of millions of individuals his choices affected.
Then Wednesday’s focused deadly capturing of the UnitedHealthcare CEO on a midtown Manhattan sidewalk thrust the manager and his enterprise into the nationwide highlight.
Thompson, who was 50, had labored on the big UnitedHealth Group Inc for 20 years and run the insurance coverage arm since 2021 after operating its Medicare and retirement enterprise.
As CEO, Thompson led a agency that gives well being protection to greater than 49 million Individuals — greater than the inhabitants of Spain. United is the biggest supplier of Medicare Benefit plans, the privately run variations of the U.S. authorities’s Medicare program for individuals age 65 and older. The corporate additionally sells particular person insurance coverage and administers health-insurance protection for 1000’s of employers and state-and federally funded Medicaid packages.
The enterprise run by Thompson introduced in $281 billion in income final 12 months, making it the biggest subsidiary of the Minnetonka, Minnesota-based UnitedHealth Group. His $10.2 million annual pay bundle, together with wage, bonus and inventory choices awards, made him one of many firm’s highest-paid executives.
The College of Iowa graduate started his profession as an authorized public accountant at PwC and had little identify recognition past the well being care trade. Even to traders who personal its inventory, the dad or mum firm’s face belonged to CEO Andrew Witty, a knighted British triathlete who has testified earlier than Congress.
When Thompson did often draw consideration, it was due to his position in shaping the way in which Individuals get well being care.
At an investor assembly final 12 months, he outlined his firm’s shift to “value-based care,” paying medical doctors and different caregivers to maintain sufferers wholesome fairly than specializing in treating them as soon as sick.
“Well being care must be simpler for individuals,” Thompson mentioned on the time. “We’re cognizant of the challenges. However navigating a future by means of value-based care unlocks a scenario the place the … household doesn’t need to make the selections on their very own.”
Thompson additionally drew consideration in 2021 when the insurer, like its opponents, was extensively criticized for a plan to start out denying cost for what it deemed non-critical visits to hospital emergency rooms.
“Sufferers should not medical consultants and shouldn’t be anticipated to self-diagnose throughout what they imagine is a medical emergency,” the chief government of the American Hospital Affiliation wrote in an open letter addressed to Thompson. “Threatening sufferers with a monetary penalty for making the incorrect determination may have a chilling impact on in search of emergency care.”
