Insurance Giant’s State-Sanctioned Training Indoctrinates Medical Providers into Woke Ideology

A major insurance company is instructing healthcare providers to adopt radical ideology in order to combat so-called “implicit bias” and racism in the healthcare system.

In a course entitled “Understanding Implicit Bias,” CareFirst – Blue Cross Blue Shield’s Maryland affiliate – teaches medical providers that racial disparities in health outcomes are partly due to inherent racism in the healthcare system, and the implicit biases of healthcare providers. As evidence, CareFirst links to resources that cite the Implicit Association Test (IAT), which purports to measure individuals’ unconscious prejudices.

The course was approved as a training eligible for American Medical Association credits for continuing medical education. Moreover, according to a press release accompanying the training, it was approved by the Maryland Department of Health and the Maryland State Medical Society for licensing requirements, so that providers can use the course to apply for and renew their license in the state.

Yet the training’s entire foundation is built on shoddy science and false assumptions.

There is no evidence that physicians generally treat minority patients worse than white patients or that unconscious racism explains racial health disparities, and the tests used to evaluate implicit bias fail to meet widely-accepted standards of reliability and validity.

For instance, a 2013 meta-analysis published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that IATs were “poor predictors” of real-world bias and discrimination.

“Twenty years of research produced very little evidence that the IAT test predicts any real-world behaviour,” University of Toronto Mississauga psychology professor Ulrich Schimmack, who spent years studying implicit bias, said in 2019. “On top of that, some of the articles that claim it does, on close inspection, fail to show that.”

Additionally, several systematic reviews have found that patients’ health outcomes are no better when they are treated by physicians of the same race. And as Do No Harm has previously reported, studies crediting racism for racial disparities in health outcomes often ignore key factors that complicate their conclusions.

In short, CareFirst’s premises are false and based on discredited theories that purport to explain racial health disparities.

Despite this, CareFirst deploys the usual panoply of woke jargon – “implicit bias,” “conscious bias,” “microaggression,” and “systemic discrimination” – to describe factors leading to negative health outcomes for minority patients.

CareFirst relies on these faulty assumptions to instruct providers to incorporate diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) principles into their organizational culture, and to assess their own implicit biases by taking tests.

In other words, CareFirst wants to indoctrinate healthcare providers into DEI ideology — and wants them to become vectors themselves. 

It’s easy to see how attributing racial disparities to implicit racism can cause harm by obscuring the more likely culprits. But more critically, urging providers to adopt DEI ideology is effectively urging them to reject science and evidence-based medicine in favor of a radical social agenda. 

That Maryland approved this training is further evidence that the medical industry and its governing bodies are at times more interested in advancing radical ideology than providing genuine medical instruction.

Maryland law requires providers to undergo implicit bias training in order to renew their licenses.

Do No Harm created its own continuing medical education course to fulfill Michigan’s similar implicit bias requirement. The course provides evidence-based information on implicit bias and critical race theory’s impact on medicine while eschewing the woke agenda typical of these trainings.

Maryland’s training is a snapshot into how various forces – governments, insurance companies and medical associations – collude to push a DEI-based agenda.

Other states should do everything possible to avoid emulating Maryland’s model.

Moreover, CareFirst should quickly take stock of its full-fledged endorsement of DEI initiatives. Ultimately, in the long run, these programs will come back to haunt the insurer.

“I can’t believe that my health insurance company is proud to peddle these divisive politics,” said the unhappy CareFirst customer who sent us the tip. “If you’re going to train your providers in anything, train them in the latest medical developments that will actually save lives. Or train your customer service agents to help people faster.”

“When I called recently to get a question answered about my benefits, I heard a recorded line warning about modified customer service hours starting at noon to allow for staff development to maintain an inclusive and equitable workplace,” the customer added. “I waited more than 30 minutes on hold. Ridiculous. Do your job.”