Whole Foods CEO Incites Uproar About Health Care

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Health care uproar focuses on Whole Foods. NPR reports: "Whole Foods has taken pains to distance itself from founder and CEO John Mackey, but it may be too late. The outspoken chief executive is so much the face of the popular natural food chain that when his health care column was published last week with the headline 'The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare,' some of his customers freaked. The op-ed piece for The Wall Street Journal slammed President Obama's health care plans and offered Mackey's own market-based ideas. It caused an uproar - some have even said they'll boycott the store."

"In his article, Mackey writes, 'the last thing the country needs is a complete government takeover of the health-care system' that would 'create hundreds of billions of dollars in new unfunded deficits.' He proposes, instead, that government free health insurance companies to be more competitive, enact tort reform to end malpractice lawsuits, and revise tax laws to favor employer-provided insurance. ... By midday Wednesday, the ''Boycott Whole Foods' page on Facebook had more than 16,000 members. And there are more than 12,000 posts on Whole Foods' own discussion forum ranging from 'Bravo, Mr. Mackey!' to 'Mackey is an abomination!'" (Burnett, 8/19).

This information was reprinted from kaiserhealthnews.org with kind permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives and sign up for email delivery at kaiserhealthnews.org.

© Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.

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