As someone who has dealt with many folks suffering from AIDS, I can say that it may even rise to the level of crimes against humanity.
It's a well-known trope (probably proven, but I don't know the studies) that insurance companies routinely delay healthcare to AIDS and other patients with terminal diseases, in the direct hope that the patient dies.
With AIDS patients, there's a big moral component to the diagnoses, and companies can "get away with it," because there's such stigma to the disease, but I have also heard of the same thing happening to cancer patients. In fact, it can sometimes be a matter of life and death. If a treatment is delayed enough, it can change the outcome.
I have been told (but don't know it for a fact) that this is actually the point of the delays, and that the delays are triggered by the diagnosis.
In many cases, delaying payment, also delays treatment. Most patients don't have an extra 500K, floating around, that they can pay the hospital for a procedure, in the hope they get reimbursed. No promise of payment, no treatment.
So that means that refusal to pay is the same as withholding treatment, and these companies know it.
I think that AI is likely to make this worse, as they will probably give these decisions to an AI, thus removing any hope that there may be a caring human in the process that could possibly feel shame.
It's a well-known trope (probably proven, but I don't know the studies) that insurance companies routinely delay healthcare to AIDS and other patients with terminal diseases, in the direct hope that the patient dies.
With AIDS patients, there's a big moral component to the diagnoses, and companies can "get away with it," because there's such stigma to the disease, but I have also heard of the same thing happening to cancer patients. In fact, it can sometimes be a matter of life and death. If a treatment is delayed enough, it can change the outcome.
I have been told (but don't know it for a fact) that this is actually the point of the delays, and that the delays are triggered by the diagnosis.
In many cases, delaying payment, also delays treatment. Most patients don't have an extra 500K, floating around, that they can pay the hospital for a procedure, in the hope they get reimbursed. No promise of payment, no treatment.
So that means that refusal to pay is the same as withholding treatment, and these companies know it.
I think that AI is likely to make this worse, as they will probably give these decisions to an AI, thus removing any hope that there may be a caring human in the process that could possibly feel shame.