Barro says raising health care costs for unvaccinated employees not ‘a great

Columnist Josh Barro says that charging employees who are not vaccinated against the coronavirus more for health insurance is not “a great road” to go down.

Barro made the comment on Hill.TV’s “Rising” on Monday, as the panel was discussing Delta Airlines’ recent decision to subject unvaccinated employees enrolled in the company’s health care plan to a $200 monthly surcharge.

“I don’t think it’s a great road to go down,” Barro said.

Barro says that while he supports getting more people unvaccinated, such a move is a bad idea because healthcare laws in the nation are designed to delink pricing from health risks. He added that there are other things that can be identified besides coronavirus vaccines that can incurs the risks of filing health insurance claims.

“I think that there are a lot of things you can inquire into where people make choices that affect their health status,” Barro said. “And I think we have good reasons for not wanting that to flow through into the pricing.”

“And so… I think this is a step down a road that we don’t want to go down,” he continued.