Health Care A Right, Comment

My comment posted on Cafe Hayek, "Is Basic Health Care a ‘Right’?" by Don Boudreaux:

If there is a right to healthcare, then it is my right not to exercise it.

Freedom of speech does not require me to speak. The right to a jury trial and an attorney gives me the right to refuse a jury trial and an attorney, and instead to be tried before a judge, to represent myself w/o an attorney, and to plea bargain with the Prosecutor.

In contradiction to a right, the right to US healthcare requires me to obtain health insurance, requires me to obtain a government approved form of health insurance with mandatory coverage provisions. As a senior single male, I am required to obtain a health insurance policy that includes payment for mammograms, pregnancy and birth control and prevents the insurer from charging me a different price than a childbearing aged female.

A right includes the right to refrain to exercise, and the right to give away all or part of my right. For example, the constitutional right against self-incrimination includes the right to waive that right and negotiate with the government the right to full or partial immunity from prosecution.

Healthcare as implemented under the new law is the antithesis of a right.