Dozens of Americans were flown back to the U.S. from Wuhan, China, and put under quarantine to check for symptoms of coronavirus. They now face large medical bills, and it's unclear who should pay, according to The New York Times.
Two of the patients who were put under quarantine were Frank Wucinski and his daughter. He accepted the U.S. government's offer in February to evacuate from Wuhan. After a two-week quarantine in California, which included two mandatory stays for Mr. Wucinski's 3-year old daughter at a children's hospital, he received nearly $4,000 in bills from hospital physicians and an ambulance company, according to The New York Times.
"I assumed it was all being paid for," Mr. Wucinski told The New York Times. "We didn’t have a choice. When the bills showed up, it was just a pit in my stomach, like, 'How do I pay for this?'"
The children's hospital that treated Mr. Wucinski's daughter told The New York Times the physicians' bill was sent in error and he would not owe the charges.
However, it is still unclear who is on the hook for payment when patients are under mandatory quarantine at a nongovernmental medical facility. A CDC spokesperson declined to comment to The New York Times on whether the agency would pay the medical bills of patients kept in mandatory isolation.
Access the full article from The New York Times here.