Free (Buggy) Rider Problem

Amish and Old Order Mennonites live like premodern people--no electricity, no car, no insurance. They don't believe in these things. That, to me, seems like insisting that secular laws don't exist and that you are governed only by some "spirit law" that cannot be seen or felt. Oh, right.

There is a large problem amongst such primitive religious communities: congenital diseases are epidemic. Shallow gene pool means everyone has a life-threatening blood disease, or a faulty liver, or a blocked-up colon. But, the Amish and the Old Mennonites don't believe in government programs or insurance, remember, so what do you think they do when they are about to keel over (or when one of the family's eleven children is deathly ill--seriously, these people have no sense of restraint, shame, or responsibility, apparently).

The answer is, they go to the nearest "English" hospital. Like Penn State medical center. There, they receive treatment, surgery, and drugs and then get massive bills for those services. Bills they cannot pay. Then the hospitals, just as they would do to you or me, put liens on their farms, sic collections agencies on them, and sue them.

So, what to do? The state, and private hospitals, surely don't want to resort to those measures, but they also aren't in the business of giving hundreds of thousands of dollars in free medical care to one large, disease-riddled Amish family after another.

I am glad to know that Mennonites and Amish will actually go to a modern hospital rather than, say, letting their children die horrible deaths just to appease their batshit crazy God (you know, like the fundamentalist Christians are wont to do). But, if we recognize the legitimacy of their beliefs, then can they ever really get access to health care in this country unless there is a major overhaul of the indigent care rules? Or would nationalizing healthcare help solve the conundrum that these populations don't believe in insurance and yet have some of the greatest need for hospital services?

Or, as my wife the policy wonk maintains, somebody needs to help the Mennonites and Amish to get their heads out of their own asses. They claim not to believe in government programs or insurance, but they step foot in state-supported medical centers and use services that we, the taxpayers, paid for. Then, they don't pay their debts because 1. they can't (no one can--hence insurance) and 2. they insist that "their communities will provide aid through mutual care." All well and good, #2, and commendable. In a better world...but, we don't live in that world. These populations can live in this country and try to be not of it, but denying you need health insurance is clearly not a viable option when you are a walking cesspool of recessive genes and congenital defects.

What to do?