County to charge for some shots, tests

Mar 2, 2010 — Times-News

Robert Boyer

Mar. 2, 2010 (McClatchy-Tribune Regional News delivered by Newstex) -- Beginning this week, the Alamance County Health Department will charge $10 for a pregnancy test and $47 for the vaccine against tetanus, diphtheria and whooping cough.

The county Board of Health approved the charges Feb. 16. They went into effect Monday.

A roughly $7 million cut to the North Carolina Immunization Program means counties must pick up the expense of theTdap vaccine, said County Health Director Barry Bass.

"We went back and calculated our costs," Bass said. "We cannot charge less than the ... Medicaid reimbursement rate."

The state could also buy the vaccine "from the manufacturer at significantly lower cost" than local health departments, county health spokesman Eric Nickens Jr. wrote in a media release.

Free vaccines are available for women who had a baby within the last six months "if no documentation of (the) Tdap vaccine exists," and for children ages 10 to 18.

No-charge vaccines are also available for anyone entering a North Carolina college or university for the first time who hasn't previously received a Tdap vaccine, or tetanus and diphtheria vaccine, which are required under state immunization law. These two provisions take effect April 1.

The Health Department charged a $10 fee for pregnancy tests before rescinding the fee in 2002. Last year, the department did about 1,500 tests and the fee is an effort to "recoup some cost," Bass said.

The cost of a pregnancy test is typically covered for those already enrolled in a Health Department program, but some women not in a program "just wanted to get a pregnancy test done," Bass added. For those women, the test will again cost $10.

In addition to the pregnancy test itself, the Health Department provides counseling on"birth control methods, sexually transmitted infection prevention, and, in the event of a positive test, options and resources related to prenatal care," Nickens wrote in his media release.

Newstex ID: KRTB-0029-42490126