ST. TROPEZ – A spokesman for the private health insurers’ trade group, America’s Health Insurance Plans, announced today that they have decided to fully support private health insurance as the right choice for America. Intern Kevin Coggshell delivered the news of the results of his groundbreaking research from the podium at the luxurious Cheval Blanc St. Tropez resort on the French Riviera, site of this year’s annual convention.
“The conclusions of my comprehensive, no-stone-unturned three-day study were definitive. Notwithstanding the fact that all other developed countries in the world have government-run national health insurance systems that provide healthcare virtually free for all citizens, the only viable choice for the United States is a system based entirely on for-profit private health insurers.”
Not being used to addressing a crown of billionaire healthcare CEOs, Coggshell’s voice was quavering as he continued, explaining that in his painstaking study he glanced at hundreds of choices, including private health insurance and nothing else. “No other solution besides private health insurance will generate such through-the-roof record profits year after year,” Coggshell asserted. He professed that the study could stand up to rigorous objective scrutiny by every single person in the room.
Coggshell received a hearty round of applause followed by the filthy rich CEOs raising their glasses of rare and outrageously priced 16-year-old Lagavulin scotch in a toast, directing their assistants to rise in a standing ovation, as they sat in their plush leather overstuffed chairs puffing on their illegally imported Cuban cigars.
At the cocktail party that evening, a drunk and repentant Coggshell could be heard mumbling to himself, “If only they had let me include Medicare,” as he wondered how he would find the money for the copay for his upcoming liver transplant.