Could the Supreme Court have been wrong"

As I understand it, the Supreme Court decision on the health care legislation concluded that the U.S. government had never before required people to buy services from private corporations that they would not otherwise have purchased. I wonder?

In the field of public health there is a centuries long history in which quarantine regulations were made and enforced by government to protect the public health. These required people, including citizens, to undergo expenses that they would not otherwise have taken. For example, people arriving in the United States by ship were sometimes required to await landing for some time on board, clearly incurring costs for doing so that they would not otherwise have incurred.

When immunizations became available, the government imposed immunization requirements on travelers, often requiring them to pay for services that they would not otherwise have purchased.

The government also imposes restrictions on researchers studying human diseases as to how disease organisms must be safeguarded, requiring expenditures that would not otherwise be made. Indeed, it imposes many regulations to protect the health and safety of laboratory personnel that require purchase of services that might otherwise not be made.

The government also imposes restrictions on entry to the United States of plants and animals to protect the health of American crops, livestock and domestic animals. These restrictions often require purchase of services from private corporations.

I could show other situations in which the government has legally required citizens to incur costs and generally to purchase services. The common element is that the regulations are intended to protect health and safety.

Requiring people to have health insurance, and requiring that the insurance cover preventive services similarly has a public health rationale. Indeed, improving the health status of the public tends to reduce the threat of communicable diseases in many ways. Healthier people have stronger immune systems that reduce the threats of these diseases. People who have easy access to medical services can be expected to utilize those services earlier when they become sick, and these early users are less likely to spread communicable diseases that are the cause of their illnesses.

Moreover, making family planning services more available to the public has been shown to reduce the frequency of illness associated with pregnancy.

I suggest that there may be many examples in the field of human, animal and plant health in which the government has imposed requirements comparable to those that the Supreme Court suggests have never been imposed.