New ad: Insurance companies have the death panels

A liberal group does some pushback against one of the trendier myths about healthcare reform

Published August 21, 2009 4:01AM (EDT)

Death panels aren't coming in healthcare reform -- they're already here.

That's the message of a new ad produced by Americans United for Change, a liberal group that's pushing for Democratic healthcare reform proposals. The ad was released Thursday night to Salon, and will begin running on cable nationally and in Washington, D.C. next week.

The spot features Linda Peeno, a doctor who's a former medical director at Humana Insurance and Blue Cross/Blue Shield, and has since turned whistleblower.

"In the spring of 1987, as a physician, I denied a man a necessary operation that would have saved his life and thus caused his death," Peeno says in the ad. "I am haunted by the thousands of pieces of paper on which I have written that deadly word, 'denial.'"

Salon's Mike Madden has written before on death panels and insurance companies; read his article here.


By Alex Koppelman

Alex Koppelman is a staff writer for Salon.

MORE FROM Alex Koppelman


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