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BCBS made almost $600 Million in profit in 2021 They're donating 2.5 million to western NC.Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBS NC) intentionally worked to slow down the Helene response in western North Carolina, according to leaked emails obtained by National File. BCBS NC directed its employees to only work with the Red Cross and one other Government related relief effort in the wake of Hurricane Helene's devastation of 25 counties in the western part of the state.
Emails and social media posts from Tunde Sotunde and Cheryl Parquet confirm the BCBS response was directly coordinated with the office of Democrat Governor Roy Cooper.
Parquet's job title raises questions about whether BCBS believes it has any responsibility to the residents of western North Carolina.
You can see the emails
here.
BCBS donations is a drop in the bucketBCBS NC recently announced
they'd donate $2.5 million to the Western NC relief.
With the non-profit generating profits that total nearly $1 billion dollars annually, that small donation represents 0.0043 — or 4 one thousandths of Blue Cross North Carolina's annual profit.
To put the donation to western North Carolina's relief effort into perspective, consider that BCBS NC's Chief Executive Officer Dr. Tunde Sotunde was awarded a
$2.1 million bonus in 2021, pushing his annual compensation to over $4 million.
Making massive profits during public health emergencies is not new for Blue Cross Blue Shield NC.
Tunde Sotunde and Cheryl Parquet are officers of the North Carolina Blue Cross Blue Shield organization.
WRAL News has been all over Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina's finances, their fast-rising premiums, and their lavish executive bonuses.
Even after the pandemic subsided, 2021 was a very good year for the Blue Cross's profit margins.
In 2021, BCBS NC generated $10.7 billion in revenue, netting about $570 million in net revenue after paying all executives handsomely.
That's a hefty profit for a non-profit company. The more than half a billion in profit represented a 118% jump from 2020 and a 16% increase from pre-pandemic 2019.
Sotunde came under fire during Covid when BCBS NC — supposedly a non-profit — began reporting record profits.
Read the emails here or on
Twitter/XDEI hiresQuestions have been raised about whether Sotunde and Parquet represent DEI hires — that is, hires driven by affirmative action and the recent invasion of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion seen in corporate and academic work spaces across the globe.
Dr. Sotunde
is a graduate of the a Nigerian medical school called University of Ibadan College of Medicine in Nigeria, class of 1988.
Sotunde completed his residency in pediatrics at Howard University hospital in 1995, according to his LinkedIn
profile.
Sotunde was
elected by the board to lead BCBS NC in 2020.
As of the end of the 2022 cycle
Tunde Sotunde had contributed $22,352 to ANTHEM PAC, the political action committee for Anthem Healthcare.
Noel is a husband and father committed to extreme accountability for public officials. In addition to publishing National File, he advises candidates for federal office who, rather than join the club, would prefer to metaphorically torch the club. Follow him @NoelFritsch on the site formerly known as Twitter.
It's egracious how badly your leaders are frugal and cheap with aid and yet lavish amongst themselves.
Don't accept any turkey dinners from that lot, as it's probably laced with arsenic.