UnitedHealth sues prominent newspaper over 'demonstrably false' report
UnitedHealth Group has filed a lawsuit against The Guardian, an influential British newspaper, after it ran a story about representatives from the insurer delaying emergency care to patients in nursing homes.
That story, published May 21, alleged the healthcare company's insurance arm paid incentives to long-term patient care facilities to reduce hospital transfers—a de facto policy that resulted in at least one serious brain injury. The Guardian used “thousands of confidential corporate and patient records obtained through sources, public records requests and court files, interviews with more than 20 current and former UnitedHealth and nursing home employees, and two whistleblower declarations submitted to Congress” as the basis for its report.
UnitedHealth has categorically denied the claims, calling the story “demonstrably false” in a Delaware Superior Court filing. They accused the newspaper of muckraking, in an effort to "capitalize" on the murder of Brian Thompson, the CEO of its subsidiary UnitedHealthcare.
According to the court filing, The Guardian did indeed use real internal emails in its exposé. However, UnitedHealth said published excerpts were taken out of context.
Those emails seemed to reveal UnitedHealth representatives—which The Guardian said were placed by the insurer in nursing homes—provided an allotment of hospital transfers, pressuring facilities to stay under a certain number. The company maintains that this is a misrepresentation of the facts and that it has no influence over the internal operations at any of the nursing homes.
In a statement to the New York Post, which was one of the first outlets to break the news, The Guardian said it stands by its reporting.
“It’s outrageous that in response to factual reporting on the practice of secretly paying nursing homes to reduce hospitalizations for vulnerable patients, UnitedHealth is resorting to wildly misleading claims and intimidation tactics via the courts,” a spokesperson told the Post.
More on the lawsuit can be found by reading the New York Post’s full coverage at the link below.
Chad is an award-winning writer and editor with over 15 years of experience working in media. He has a decade-long professional background in healthcare, working as a writer and in public relations.