Michael Lenworth

Public interest law and consulting is what I do best.

A Reuters report yesterday pointed to an insurance company practice that's so awful, it's almost hard to believe. Reporter Murray Waas explained that WellPoint, an insurance powerhouse, apparently developed a policy of targeting customers with breast cancer, and then launching fraud investigations against them so their coverage could be dropped.

The practice is just breathtaking. According to government regulators and investigators, the affected customers had paid all their premiums and had no problems with their insurer, but WellPoint decided their breast cancer treatment would be expensive. It was easier to investigate them, rely on "erroneous or flimsy information," and drop the customers before the medical bills started piling up, Murray Waas reported for Reuters.

It's "rescission" at its most offensive.

Just yesterday, we read with great alarm a news report that WellPoint, one of the country's largest health insurers, is routinely dropping coverage for women that are diagnosed with breast cancer.