Murdered Health Insurance Exec Scorned By Social Media

News in the United States was briefly dominated by a report about the fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson outside a Midtown Manhattan hotel on 4 December. Police are following the lead on the missing gunman in what they called a "premeditated, pre-planned, targeted attack."

Instead of being disgusted by the murder and condemn the act, social media nstead erupted with contempt for the health insurance industry the victim represented — and his company in particular.

"Saw mainstream news coverage about the killing of the CEO of United Healthcare on TikTok and I think political and industry leaders might want to read the comments and think hard about them," wrote political activist Tobita Chow in a post on X, formerly Twitter.

In screenshots he shared, TikTok users reacted to the story with blistering references to the costly and often unnavigable for-profit U.S. health insurance system. "Sending prior authorization, denied claims, collections & prayers to his family," wrote one.

"As someone covered under UnitedHealthCare I can completely understand the actions taken," wrote an X user replying to a news link about Thompson’s murder "being investigated as a possible hit," according to a statement from law enforcement.

"Did he have a pre-existing condition?" asked another. And under an ABC News TikTok on police officers’ efforts to find the killer, a user asked, "Why are they investigating this?"

"Got a push notification to exercise caution because the United Healthcare shooter is still at large," noted standup comic Samantha Ruddy in her own X post. "I personally do not feel like I am on the shooter’s radar because I am not the CEO of a highly divisive multi billion dollar insurance company."

Thompson’s violent death outside a hotel where UnitedHealthcare was hosting an investor conference didn’t just prompt scathing jokes but heated criticism of the insurer he had helmed since 2021.

One image that made the rounds online was a chart from the personal finance website ValuePenguin, which found that UnitedHealthcare denies 32 percent of all in-network claims relating to individual health insurance plans — twice the industry average. Some pointed to headlines describing how UnitedHealthcare has used an allegedly faulty AI algorithm to assess claims and deny care for seriously ill patients on private Medicare Advantage plans, as described in an ongoing class-action lawsuit brought by the estates of two deceased people who were denied coverage for their care at an extended-care facility.

Among those who amplified that story was podcaster Tim Pool, suggesting that Americans across the political spectrum can find rare consensus when it comes to disdain for their free-market health care system.

"It’s actually kind of touching that the one thing that can bring together our fractious and disunited country is celebrating the assassination of a health insurance CEO," wrote University of Virginia historian David Austin Walsh on X.