In his piece about the Church of the Savvy, David Waldman provided a clip of Jane Hamsher being interviewed by Andrea Mitchell:
What caught my ear was when Hamsher mentioned that Sen. Evan Bayh's wife Susan is on the board of Wellpoint, the largest health insurance provider in the country.
Make the jump:
I was intrigued by this because a couple of months back I learned that Wellpoint (Anthem) controls 78% of the health insurance market in Maine, and so any conflict of interest that Sen. Bayh might have will affect the Pine Tree State.
I contacted Scott at Hoosier Pundit for more info, and he pointed me to this article by Daniel Lee in the Indianapolis Star, Susan Bayh an issue in fight over health care, and there I learned that Wellpoint is just one board of directors that Susan Bayh sits on. The others include:
• Dendreon:Seattle-based biotech company focused on cancer treatments.
• MDRNA: Bothell, Wash., biotech company developing therapeutics to treat liver diseases.
• Curis: Cambridge, Mass., drug-development company focused on cancer treatments.
• Dyax: Cambridge, Mass., biopharmaceuticals company developing treatments for use in oncology and inflammation.
Bayh resigned from MDRNA this past January.
From these and Wellpoint, Susan Bayh received $2,140,253 in compensation.
Surely there is at least the appearance of a conflict of interest, despite what Sen. Bayh says. He is also a member of the Senate Finance Committee, chaired by Max Caucus, whom has received more than $3.9 million in campaign contributions from the industry.