Heath Insurance Companies Contribute to Death of 'Norma Rae'

There are times in life when the real-world actions of everyday people are shared with the world by Hollywood movies. That was the case of Crystal Lee Sutton. Her union organizing work in the South inspired the 1979 movie, "Norma Rae".

It saddened me to learn that she passed away last week after a long battle with brain cancer. Sutton’s story is particularly tragic because after fighting her whole life for rights of working Americans, her health insurance wouldn’t cover the medications she needed:

She went two months without possible life-saving medications because her insurance wouldn’t cover it, another example of abusing the working poor, she said.

“How in the world can it take so long to find out (whether they would cover the medicine or not) when it could be a matter of life or death,” she said. “It is almost like, in a way, committing murder.”

I suspect that Ms. Sutton was counting on President Obama to sign health care reform legislation that would improve the lives of the working poor. Time tells if he is able to do so. For now, we simply pray that Ms. Sutton rests in peace.