For this special report cover story, we went for a visual rhetorical trope, bold in simplicity, leading straight to the core of the subject: the rapidely increasing, bitterly exorbitant costs of medical care in the United States. To convey the message in its full force, we created a classic uncoated physical pill prop — the horribly bitter kind — adorned with the headline embossed into it, maximizing the tactile feel of the treatment through macro-photography.