General
Brian Thompson, Health Insurance Executive, Dies at 50
He was “a truly extraordinary person who touched the lives of countless people,” the chief executive of UnitedHealth Group said.
Brian R. Thompson, the chief executive of UnitedHealthcare, who was fatally shot in Midtown Manhattan on Wednesday in what police called a brazen, targeted killing, spent more than 20 years ascending the ranks at one of the nation’s leading insurance businesses while raising a family in suburban Minneapolis.
Mr. Thompson, who was 50, lived with his wife, Paulette Thompson, and their younger son, Dane, in Maple Grove, Minn. An older son, Bryce, is a college freshman.
As of Wednesday afternoon, a perpetrator seen in security footage released by the New York Police Department was still at large. The motive for the killing was unknown, according to authorities. Mr. Thompson and other company executives were in New York for an annual investors’ meeting.
Mr. Thompson was rewarded with the top executive position at UnitedHealthcare, overseeing about 140,000 people, in April 2021, after a career with the company that began in 2004.
Before his promotion, he ran the division of the health insurance giant, based in Minnetonka, Minn., that oversaw its government insurance business, including Medicaid and Medicare plans.
The company’s Medicare Advantage plans, which are private insurance policies, had become a profit center with the retirement wave of aging baby boomers. UnitedHealthcare is the largest provider of Medicare Advantage plans in the country.
