Police on Thursday arrested 11 people on trespassing charges during a protest at health insurance giant CIGNA's office at a Rte. 16 office park.
The 11 were among more than 75 activists who staged a protest claiming that CIGNA does not provide adequate care to its patients and that the company is using its money to lobby against health care reform in Washington.
"Private insurance companies like CIGNA are morally responsible" to patients, said event organizer Russ Davis of Jobs with Justice, a workers' rights group.
"We want to talk to them," said Benjamin Day of Mass-Care, a single-payer health care advocacy group. "We want them to support patients."
The protests come as Congress continues to debate health care reform and universal health coverage.
Representatives from America's Health Insurance Plans, an industry trade association, could not be reached for comment.
A small parade of union members, activists and other universal health care advocates took to the sidewalk in front of the building, holding signs with slogans such as "CIGNA Profits, People Suffer" and shouting chants such as "health care for all."
Davis criticized CIGNA for what he viewed as its opposition to universal health coverage.
"They want everybody to be forced to buy private insurance," Davis said.
Only 3 percent of Massachusetts adults, about 170,000 people, do not have health insurance, according to a report released by Gov. Deval Patrick's administration on Tuesday.
The demonstration at CIGNA was one of 10 "day of action" protests against insurance companies nationwide, Day said.
The march also featured a "die-in," in which 13 protesters lay still on the ground pretending to be people who died because CIGNA denied them coverage. During the die-in, organizers read two anti-CIGNA stories.
The National Committee for Quality Assurance, a health care improvement organization, ranked CIGNA HealthCare of Massachusetts 36th out of 290 commercial health plans in 2008.
At the end of the die-in, protester Jason Faria of the Service Employees Industrial Union, masquerading as a CIGNA executive, went around cutting green balloons with dollar signs on them off the wrists of the die-in protesters, a physical representation, said protester and SEIU member Courtney Snegroff, of how CIGNA takes money from patients.
After the die-in, three protesters made speeches to the crowd.
Then, the 11 protesters walked toward CIGNA's offices and the police. More than 15 officers patrolled the area.
"We are not going to leave until we deliver this pledge," Day said to the crowd.
As police officers handcuffed the protesters, other activists yelled chants of "CIGNA's the criminals" and "Arrest CIGNA not us." Protesters cheered as the squad cars pulled away, with other protesters inside.
"We appreciate their freedom of speech and we protect all forms of speech," Newton Police Lt. Bruce Apotheker said. "We don't relish making arrests."
Protesters contacted the Newton Police on Tuesday, informing officers of the action in advance and declaring that some protesters wanted to be arrested, Apotheker said.
"They were very cooperative," he said. "They told us exactly what they were going to do."
In a statement, CIGNA said, "Although we respect that there are different opinions on the solutions, those opinions must be based on fact. The fact is, CIGNA supports reform that will give all Americans access to quality, affordable health care coverage, and we agree that changes to the system are long overdue."
