Would You Divorce Your Wife for Her Health?

Deborah Shank was hit by a truck. At the time, she was an employee of Wal-Mart. Her health insurance covered her hospital and physical therapy bills. This makes sense, she was paying out of each check to have her health insurance. Her medical bills amounted to over $400,000, all covered by her health insurance.

Several weeks after the accident, the woman won a settlement of around $415,000. This is good because this woman has suffered brain damage and is going to need constant care for the rest of her life.

Unfortunately, this is not where the story ends. Apparently Wal-Mart’s health insurance policy has an addendum that allows them to recoup any health insurance expenses when someone gets an accident settlement. Wal-Mart sued their own employee to the tune of $470,000. More money than they had paid for her medical bills. Apparently they needed to pay their lawyers as well.

To add insult to injury, the woman’s son died in Iraq just six days after the accident.

Even worse: after they lost the lawsuit, the woman and her husband decided to get a divorce because she could get more money from Medicare if she were single. You can see Keith Olberman’s editorial about it at this video.

My question for you, men, is this: would you do the same for your wife?

While I understand the sentiment that went into this decision, and would never want to be put into this situation, I wonder at the decision.

Marriage is a sacred bond that allows two people to be together forever. I believe that God is the author of that contract and that two people should only break that contract under certain circumstances (read: infidelity or abuse). As hard as this situation is, I believe that they would have been better off staying together.

Update: As of 4/2 Wal-Mart announced that they were dropping the lawsuit. I don’t know if the couple still plans on divorcing, but the following questions is still relevant.

Do you think that divorce in this situation was the right idea?