We need bodies on the sidewalk. We need to demonstrate our passion about health care reform and the public option. Help get out the progressive message: take part in a demonstration Tuesday, Sept. 22 at noon across from Union Station, in front of the WellPoint offices.

Let’s challenge WellPoint’s near monopoly in five Missouri cities.

If you live in St. Louis, finagle an extra long lunch hour and show up. Don’t bother bringing a sign. HCAN is supplying them. They prefer a sea of large, easy to read signs and a consistent message.

The HCAN memo about this rally says:

Let the public know that if big insurance wins, then the people lose big-time!

WellPoint is a huge insurance company. It is the largest member of the Alliance Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association. The corporation in 2008 was number 33 in the Fortune 500 and can tout one in nine Americans as customers in fourteen states–including Missouri. WellPoint, like Cigna and United Health Care, is an example of profit-driven health insurance worst practices. And since January 2008, WellPoint, just like its corporate insurance counterparts, spent about $7 million on federal lobbyists to spoil insurance reform.

WellPoint rewards its employees for dropping members’ health care coverage. The Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee revealed WellPoint “evaluated employee performance based in part on the amount of money its employees saved the company through retroactive rescissions of health insurance policies. According to documents obtained by the committee, one WellPoint official was awarded a perfect score of five for exceptional performance, based on having saved the company nearly $10 million through rescissions.” [House Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee, 6/16/09]

The lady’s sign says it: “Insurance profits are bad for my health.”