What a total dick, to single out two babies' cost, especially when compared to his own compensation. One of my children was born premature and even though it was nothing compared to what these people went through it makes me very much aware of the kind of thoughts that go through your head during and afterwards. To have the CEO of the company you work for use you as a scapegoat (and in an easily identifiable context too) for cutting benefits is absolutely un-acceptable.
I just can't get over how shitty a human being Armstrong seems to be. When you offer health benefits to employees by self-insuring, paying for premature babies is just part of the obligation you took on. Complaining about it publicly is not only shameful and illegal, it's an admission that you're an asshole that doesn't want to hold up your end of business dealings.
> “This is what we do in the US. We blame the sick people for being expensive, but the same sick people everywhere else – in the UK – they wouldn’t be causing excess costs to the system,” said Peel.<p>This line bugs me.<p>Regardless of <i>who</i> pays for medical care, the costs just don't disappear. With a bigger pool, they're spread across more people so the marginal costs might be lower but the total cost remains the same.
Let's skip the word "blame". Is it a fact that sick people is the cause for being expensive? Our company also had to increase premium because a few extreme cases last year, but the company did not identify them. The employees figured out anyway.<p>Of course, blame the sick people could be wrong, when the sickness is not caused by the sick people, like the one in the article. However, the implicit message in the title troubles me: it is always wrong to blame the sick -- which is not true.