Navigation

Letter to the Editor: Unvaccinated People Should Pay Their Own Medical Bills

This letter is on behalf of all the citizens of America who wore masks, quarantined themselves and got vaccinated when they may have preferred not to because it benefited themselves, all Americans, Congress and the current unvaccinated.

Those who refuse to be vaccinated cite personal freedom as the reason. If it is a personal freedom not to be vaccinated, then it is also a personal freedom to pay for the consequences of not being vaccinated.

In a democracy, when you don’t do what’s right, you lose the freedom to do it. Therefore, I suggest the following executive order: “Americans must begin vaccination by Sept. 1, 2021, and complete it by Sept. 15, 2021. After that, unvaccinated individuals are responsible for their medical bills.”

Democracy rules. Not Congress. Not minorities.

As a practicing pharmacist for 40-plus years, I have become aware of public attitudes. The first is, “I do not have to take care of myself because I have insurance.” This is why wellness cannot be sold. Taking care of oneself is work. They’d rather risk illness covered by insurance than become educated and take care of themselves. The fact that almost 50% of Americans are not vaccinated is substantiating this attitude.

I’ve just identified where the problem lies with unvaccinated Americans and America’s health care system. The answer to the alarming total cost of America’s health care system is the sequence of service payments.

Currently the order of payment is this: The provider (hospital, doctor, pharmacist) bills the insurance company/government, which makes the initial payment. If there’s a balance due, the provider bills the patient.

The new proposed system is the same as it is for all other businesses: The provider bills the patient and informs the insurance company of the bill. The patient pays the provider in one business week. The insurance company pays the patient. If the patient does not have money to pay the provider, the patient gets a bank loan. Banks should have no problem with this because it’s almost a guaranteed loan as the patient has provided insurance information to the bank.

Brian Hansen

Algoma, Wisconsin