Rebien tells US politicians to “get on with it”

At the recent US debate forum City Club of Cleveland, Novo Nordisk CEO Lars Rebien Sørensen offered his unreserved opinion on the political bickering over the Affordable Health Care Act.
Foto: Niels Hougaard / Jyllands-Posten
Foto: Niels Hougaard / Jyllands-Posten

What does Lars Rebien Sørensen have in common with Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt, Ronald Regan and Bill Clinton? Or Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Robert Kennedy, George Soros, Henry Kissinger and Ted Turner for that matter?

They have all been invited to speak at The City Club of Cleveland – a politically independent debate ground, where the speaker offers a few opening remarks, before the floor is opened to questions from the audience.

At the speaking engagement, Novo Nordisk’s CEO was asked about his opinion on President Barack Obama’s controversial Affordable Care Act, Obamacare, writes the Huffington Post.

You can send a man to the moon

The Danish company obviously has its own interests to look out for in relation to the political environment in the US, and Lars Rebien repeatedly stressed that his words reflected his own, personal opinion.

“There’s no way you can get away from not offering health services to everyone. You have to excuse me, this is my cultural upbringing. To me it’s inconceivable. It’s not dignified not to have people covered by basic health care services. I can’t see you can roll that back,” he started out by saying.

“The next thing is then; can you put in place insurance schemes that are priced in a way where it is not going to be detrimental to small businesses and to private contractors, thereby putting them out of business? This is of course where it’s going to get tricky. But I’m optimistic. I’ve understood there has been some system glitches in starting up the exchanges, but I have to believe that if you can send a man to the moon, you’re going to be able to put a software system together where you can register insurance,” he said, adding:

“I know it’s complicated, and all of us, who work in companies, we have tried to introduce new IDP systems, and it’s always failing and it always becomes more expensive and complicated, but you can do it. I think you just have to get on with it.”

See a full-length video of the debate meeting from Huffington Post here.

Rebien sees positive market development for obesity drugs

Rebien is top of the heap 

Rebien is among the best in the world 

- translated by Martin Havtorn Petersen

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