“Sicko” to show at Buskirk-Chumley

Wendell Potter is coming to Bloomington to speak of his experience and promote his new book, “Deadly Spin: An Insurance Company Insider Speaks Out on How Corporate PR Is Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans.”

Potter’s speech, sponsored by Hoosiers for a Commonsense Health Care Plan, will be 3 p.m. Sunday at the Buskirk-Chumley Theater.

Working his way up the public relations ladder, Potter discovered the hypocrisy of the United States health care system.

Potter worked as a corporate public relations executive for the global health insurance company Connecticut General Life Insurance Company for more than 15 years. During that time, he rallied against Michael Moore’s 2007 documentary “Sicko.”

Then something in him changed. He has now switched gears and is acting as a
whistle-blower.

“We have more people who are uninsured in this country than the entire population of Canada,” Potter said in an interview with PBS’s Bill Moyer on July 10, 2009.

Michael Moore’s documentary “Sicko” will also be shown at the event, and Jacobs School of Music singer Sylvia McNair and guitarist David Guylas will be performing once the doors open at 2:30 p.m.

“We are hoping to inform people,” said Karen Green Stone, Hoosiers for Commonsense Community Educator and Bloomington resident. “We want them to see through the disastrous PR campaigns that health care groups have created.”

Karen is the wife of Rob Stone, MD, Director of Hoosiers for Commonsense.

Rob and Karen first met Potter while in Boston at the Physicians for a National Health Program state chapter. The PNHP is an advocate group also working for health reform.

Potter stayed with the Stone family in May when he attended the Indianapolis rally for Hoosiers for a Commonsense Health Care Plan.

“He’s an honest country man from the hills of Tennessee,” Rob said.

Rob and Karen said they are excited to better educate Bloomington citizens and students of the health care crisis.

“It’s going to be big,” Rob said.

Hoosiers for Commonsense grew into a statewide organization five years ago, Karen said. Before, it was a local Bloomington group.

“We devote a lot of our lives to it,” she said. “We are extremely passionate about this.”