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Apology made for slave policies

Thursday, March 9, 2000 | 10:59 a.m.

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

NEW YORK -- Aetna Inc., the nation's largest health insurer, apologized today for selling policies in the 1850s that reimbursed slave owners for financial losses when their slaves died.

"Aetna has long acknowledged that for several years shortly after its founding in 1853 that the company may have insured the lives of slaves," Aetna spokesman Fred Laberge said today. "We express our deep regret over any participation at all in this deplorable practice."

Aetna's public apology was prompted by an inquiry from a New York attorney.

Aetna, which noted that the slave policies were legal before slavery was abolished, said it plans to make no reparations. "We have concluded that no further actions are required at this time," Laberge said.

Aetna said its records show the company wrote no more than a dozen such policies to slave owners.

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