Two weeks ago, when I wrote the article “Those Who Refuse the Vaccine are Facing the Consequences,” I couldn’t have imagined the number of comments that the article would generate, both pro and con. When I wrote the article I tried to explain that if you don’t get the Covid shot, you and you alone will be responsible for your actions and rejecting a Covid shot.
| Editor’s note: Since Clyde’s article was published on July 25, it has received 30,000 page views, making it the most-read article over the last three months. It also attracted anti-vaxxer comments, which have been deleted. The Blog for Arizona is not a platform for science-denying anti-vaxxers. |
Since the article came out, there have been many more restrictions put on unvaccinated people and requirements for mask-wearing by businesses and school districts across the country.
In Sunday’s Arizona Daily Star, six stories pointed out new Covid restrictions such as:
- Study offers clues about kids and Covid19
- United Airlines will require vaccinations for employees
- Norwegian Cruise Line challenges Florida COVID ‘vaccine passport’ ban
- Kid COVID Cases Increase Across US.
- Poll examines COVID blame game
- The Huge Economic Costs of Refusing the COVID-19 Vaccine
One article is especially pertinent: Nearly all COVID deaths in US are now among unvaccinated
In the past two weeks, Republican governors in some states, including Arizona, have found out that businesses and school boards are going to do what is right to protect their customers and employees and children in their care.
Arizona Gov. Ducey demanded that school districts scrap their quarantine policies, but ten districts so far have told the Governor that schools are within their legal rights to keep unvaccinated students exposed to confirmed cases COVID-19 out of school for up to two weeks.
The last sentence of my article seems to have upset the anti-vaxxers the most “that when contacting Covid, they should agree to pay for all their hospital bills out of their pocket. However, an article published in the Kaiser Health News (August 2021) points out some ramifications for people who have insurance but refuse to get the Covid shot.
Getting hospitalized with Covid-19 in the United States typically generates huge bills. For example, those submitted by Covid patients to the NPR-Kaiser Health News Bill of the Month project include a $17,000 bill for a brief hospital stay in Marietta, GA; a $104,000 bill for a 14-day hospitalization in Miami for an uninsured person; a bill of hundreds of thousands for a two-week hospital stay for a foreign tourist in Hawaii whose travel health insurance contained a pandemic exclusion.
- In 2020, before there were Covid-19 vaccines, most major private insurers waived patient payments from coinsurance to deductibles for Covid treatment. But many, if not most, have allowed that policy to lapse. Aetna, for example, ended that policy on Feb. 28; UnitedHealth care began rolling back its waivers late last year and discontinued them by the end of March.
- Why should patients be kept financially unharmed from what is now a preventable hospitalization, thanks to a vaccine that the government has made available for free? The Affordable Care Act allows insurers to charge smokers up to 50 percent more than nonsmokers pay for some types of health plans — why not for anti-vaxxers? The logic behind the policies is that the offenders’ behavior can hurt others and costs society a lot of money by refusing to get the Covid shot. But what if the financial cost of not getting vaccinated were just too high? If patients thought about the price they might need to pay for their care, maybe they would reconsider remaining unprotected.
My article attracted nonsensical comments from anti-vaxxers. One anti-vaxxer said only God could end the vaccine. I suggest he read Nearly all COVID deaths in US are now among unvaccinated.
Another anti-vaxxer comment compared getting the Covid vaccination to voting and said voting is a scam because there is no honesty in the vote count. Claiming that democracy is simply mob rule and voting changes nothing. How does that relate to the Covid vaccine?
A family member who is a Pediatric Cardiothoracic Surgeon has told me that the last pediatric patient he had died much too early. When I inquired why the patient died, he replied, “he died from lack of proper vaccinations.” This, of course, was before Covid, but if a Covid shot is not soon available for pediatrics and if parents refuse to have their child vaccinated for Covid, there will be much more death. Only this time, it will be small innocent children who pay the ultimate price.
“For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.”
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Lil Johnny K has once again failed to think things through.
He says all the replies agree with the premise, My reply from last week did not, and Liza has since replied in kind. He didn’t take the time to verify his accusations.
In his reply to his own comment he says there was a personal attack. If he could comprehend his own writing he would recognize the insults in his own comments.
He also seems to think a handful of replies on a website are representative of all liberals.
Because the racist republican party is a hive mind, people like Lil’ Johnny assume everyone else is as well.
These are crazy times, to be sure. Here I am, in agreement with Rep John K.
At this time, access to healthcare in this country is a disjointed mess. We’ve got Medicare, Medicare Advantage, Medicaid, the VA, Indian Health Service, the ACA, CHIP, employer provided insurance, ER only for the uninsured, and so forth. The underlying belief in this mostly profit driven “system” is that healthcare should be doled out based on ability to pay for it. So you have access to healthcare if you have insurance, wealth, or you belong to one of the groups covered by social programs. And access varies based on ability to pay because there are thousands of insurance “plans” and there are rules associated with social programs.
What we do not need now or ever or for any reason is to add a moral judgement to an already failing system that doles out healthcare inequitably and leaves tens of millions of Americans uninsured or under-insured.
If we start making these moral judgements, where would it end? Smokers shouldn’t get treated for lung cancer? No healthcare for people with sexually transmitted diseases? No healthcare for drunk drivers who had collisions? We could go on and on. I remember the AIDS epidemic and my evangelical friends saying these people deserved to die.
Believe me, I’m as distressed as anyone by the unvaccinated and the likelihood that we will never reach herd immunity and will succumb to more COVID variants for God knows how long. I’m not too pleased about getting booster shots either. And the burden on healthcare workers and hospitals has got to be addressed.
I don’t have the answers but what I am absolutely certain about is that entering the realm of who “deserves” treatment based on the degree to which they caused their own medical problem is not the right solution.
Mr. Steele, very nicely done! To paraphrase Rolf Harris:
So you tanned his hide
His brain is fried, Clyde
And that’s it handing on the shed.
Excellent dodge and evasive post. All too common on BfA. How about addressing my comments instead of launching a personal attack and changing the subject? Will you apply your no insurance rule to overweight people and drug abusers? And why is the disparate effect of your policy on minorities not racist, as per leftist dogma? Don’t hide but address the issues. Answer my comments. While not expected on this blog, it would be intellectually honest and refreshing.
So Arizona Republican State Legislature (John Kavanagh) is now suddenly concerned about health care for minorities. His Republican Party led 70 attempts to repeal, modify or otherwise curb the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obama Care) in Congress. If Kavanagh is so worried about minorities and the disadvantaged perhaps he should agree to raise the State Income Tax on corporations and high earners instead of cutting their taxes and instead vote to reduce regressive taxes that hurt the poor and middle class. Or how about higher taxes on gun sales to help cover the cost of gun violence? If Republicans are so worked up about mandates (wearing masks) for school children how about instead worry about that lack of public school funding instead of having a financial interest in Charter schools? You can’t claim freedom of choice and claim Hospitals can’t claim the freedom to deny service for un-vaccinated or insurance companies to claim the freedom to pay because of risky behavior. In a survey by Arizona Charter Schools, he was asked “What is the greatest challenge facing Arizona today?” Kavanagh answered, “The Covid harmed the economy.” Instead of worrying about vaccination rates for minorities and Covid death he’s worried about the economy.
So much for the left believing healthcare is a universal right and that we should have free healthcare for all. I don’t know what surprises me more, the fact that this posting is on this blog or the fact that the only people who have replied defend the principle offered. And that principal could be easily expanded to other health situations where the person with the condition contributed to it. For example, should we deny insurance reimbursement to those with diabetes and heart conditions who are overweight because, after all, many of them contributed to their conditions? And let’s not even discuss what we should do with people who abuse drugs and need emergency care.
Also, not mentioned by the author or commentators is the fact that from the perspective of a leftist, this is an extremely racist idea. After all, aren’t vaccination rates among minorities, especially blacks, lower than average? That means that this policy would have a disparate effect on minorities and, consequently, by leftist reasoning that makes this a racist policy.
I don’t get much information from this blog but it does provide excellent entertainment.
How about we have Fox News, the GQP, and the rest of the pandemic-deniers pay the medical bills.
Things like motorcycle accidents, smoking, drinking, fast food diets, desk jobs, ammosexuals shooting holes into themselves and others, getting airlifted from Camelback when it’s 118 degrees, among other things, are all problematic when discussing who pays for insurance.
I don’t want to see these people’s lives and families destroyed because Fox News and the rest told them Fauci was the devil and vaccines are poison.
What we need is medicare for all, with a side of lawsuits for the liars and charlatans.
thanks Clyde for the article and I love your artwork. The fellow reminds me of Pigpen from Peanuts Comics.
If you choose to be irresponsible and a liability on the public, have chosen the fool’s way and the expected and known consequences, then you should bear the costs. That’s what accountability is?
Totally agree.
Great idea.
We need some advocacy.