Defrauding Insurance Companies

Shaitels (Tablet)

I cannot verify the legitimacy of this comment. No clue of it was ever said. It may have been made up. It was overheard - and sent to me by someone I know - of impeccable  integrity. 

So why even mention it? Unfortunately I have heard comments like this before by very religious Jews. The idea being that one can easily get the someone else (e.g. the government or n insurance company) to pay for something you want using fraudulent means. In this case an individual was apparently telling a friend or aquanitance that the shaitel macher could provide her with the name of a doctor that will falsely diagnose her with a medical condition that requires her to wear a wig. And thereby defraud  her health insurance into paying for it.

This is not as far fetched as one might think.  One shaitel outlet (Shulywigs) has the following statement on her website: 

A wig is a great way to change up your style, hair color or just have fun but for those with a medical condition, it is much more. For over 70 years, doctors have been prescribing cranial prosthesis for patients with alopecia areata, alopecia totalis, trichotillomania, chemotherapy and other medical conditions or treatments that result in hair loss.

The cranial prosthesis is different from a traditional wig in that it helps to protect the wearer from the sun and helps regulate body temperature. These are important for those who have compromised immune systems due to disease or medical treatments. In the many decades they have been prescribed, there have been advancements in the technology used for making cranial prosthesis.

Not so sure this is covered even if you can convince the insurer of the lie. But that is beside the point.  Which is that fraud appears to be a common way of life in some religious circles. If you can get away with it – why not?  High quality Shaitels are expensive –  costing on the average 3 or 4 thousand dollars and even up to $13,000! Many women have more than one - and buy a new one every few years.

I am not casting any aspersions on buying expensive wigs.  Married women are required by Halacha to cover their hair. The majority of Poskim allow that to be done with a wig (Peah Nachris). This allows married women to look their best in public. I have no problem with anyone buying an expensive wig if they wish. There is absolutely nothing wrong with a woman looking her best and spending as much money she wishes in order to achieve that.

What upsets me at is the suggestion that getting someone else to pay for it by fraudulent means is an acceptable way to finance it. A Shaitel website that describes a medical condition requiring specialized wigs  is really nothing more than a thinly disguised invitation to defraud an insurance company.

Now It’s true that most Orthodox Jews - regardless of their Hahshkfa wouldn’t dream of doing this. Most would be just as appalled by it as I am. But what that website tells me is that there are enough people willing to do that to make it worthwhile to suggest it on their website.

This is a Chilul HaShem waiting to happen. I can read the headlines now.

What it also does is feed the antisemites of the world about ‘devious  greedy Jews who take great pleasure in ripping off honest hard working white Christian Americans’.  

The fact that religious Jews are not the only ones that do that is irrelevant. My guess is that there are the same proportion of non Jews that do things like this as there are religious Jews .But that doesn’t matter. When a religious looking Jew who values Haalcha enough to cover her hair in public does so by paying for it with it with fraud  – that is no Mitzvah. It is a Chilul HaShem that the antisemites of the world well exploit it and  trumpet it with glee.  Even though vast majority of us are not like that they will say we are all that way.

That there have been so many instances of fraud by religious looking Jews in the past - some of them prominent - does not help matters. 

This is not being a light unto the nations. This is being a darkness unto the nations. Judaism is not only about keeping Shabbos meticulously. It it also about not stealing. Violating either of those things is sinful behavior. Only in the case of the latter, the Chilul Hashem and danger to us is so much greater. If only my coreligionists that suggest fraudulent behavior - no matter how subtly -would realize this.