To The Editor:The Bee has been drawn into the fray through its recent republication of an article that appeared in The Connecticut Mirror by Ana Radelat, "Aetna's Bertolini: ACA Has Not Met Its Goals."The Bee has a responsibility to its readers to fact check articles themselves before reprinting from other publications.Editor's Note: Readers can find earlier Connecticut Mirror stories referencing the above mentioned federal court ruling at ctmirror.org/2017/01/23/judge-blocks-aetna-humana-merger/ and at ctmirror.org/2017/01/24/aetna-humana-still-weighing-appeal-of-ruling-blocking-merger/, which appeared prior to Ms Radelat's story on Mr Bertolini's comments regarding the issue. The Newtown Bee supports the integrity of The Connecticut Mirror reporting in that article.

A significant amount of the public discourse over the past year has centered on the emergence of "fake news" and "alternative facts." The check and balance against such falsehoods in our society has always been a free and independent press, who are supposed to hold our leaders, institutions, and businesses to a standard of truthfulness which is not only expected, but demanded by our society. It now appears

The article opens with a statement from Aetna's CEO Mark Bertolini that the insurer would not be expanding its participation in state exchanges and that Aetna had reduced its participation in state exchanges from 15 states in 2016, to just 4 in 2017. It tries to justify these actions with a claim that despite making over $2.9 billion in 2016, that it lost $450 million on policies sold through ACA exchanges. However, we now have factual evidence that Aetna has been less than truthful to the public and the federal government about the profitability of its ACA exchange businesses and its rationale for dropping out of 11 state exchanges.

Prior to the publication of the article, a federal court ruled that Aetna had failed to disclose the real reason for dropping coverage in 11 states. Aetna was found guilty because they were attempting to force the government to approve their $37 billion merger with Humana. Evidence in the case clearly showed that in at least four of the 11 states where Aetna dropped ACA exchange health plans, Aetna was clearly making money. The reality is hardworking people lost their chosen insurance plan because a greedy CEO was attempting to blackmail our government into reducing competition in the health care insurance industry.

Bertolini actually made the mistake of making that threat in writing to the Department of Justice during its review of the merger, while other internal company communications included confirmation that Aetna dropped ACA exchange sales in Florida despite the fact they were clearly making money in the state.

When the head of Aetna's Florida business questioned the decision to drop a profitable business line by e-mail, he was told to discuss the matter by phone "to avoid leaving a paper trail." Clearly, Aetna is in "spin" mode trying to cover up the damning evidence unleashed by this recent court decision.

Regards,

Peter Sandler

4 Far Horizon Lane, Sandy Hook         February 8, 2017