Lifeguard Saves 12 Year Old’s Life and Gets Emergency Room Bill for 26 Hundred Dollars – Should Lifeguard Have to Pay it [POLL]
August 2, 2012 3:38 PM 
This comes to us out of the great Northwest.
Which goes to show you that BS is ubiquitous!
A newly minted lifeguard heard the screams of a 12 year old boy, jumped into the ocean to rescue him…and after getting ashore where both were taken to a nearby hospital emergency room by ambulance; subsequently got a bill for his efforts.
Yes, HE (the lifeguard) got the bill!
Should he have to pay it?
Seventeen-year-old John Clark, a senior at Hudson’s Bay, says he didn’t think twice about running into the ocean to save a drowning 12-year-old.
But what he hasn’t stopped thinking about, is the bill he received as a result of his effort.
Nearly a month ago, John Clark heard screams for help from a 12-year-old swept out to sea.
The call for help came just five days after Clark had been certified as a lifeguard.
So John Clark dove in — through the breakers and heavy swells — to reach the boy in the ocean. Then he calmed the boy down, and kept him afloat.
Jet skis arrived and pulled both of them to shore.
John had a headache, and the 12-year-old was wrapped in a blanket to warm up. Into the ambulance they both went.
Clark thought the trip to Tillamook General Hospital was standard procedure; he didn’t give it a second thought until several weeks later … when the bill arrived.
The emergency room bill came to $449. The physician’s bill was $227. The 15-mile ride in the ambulance to Tillamook: $1,907. The total bill for saving a young man’s life? Nearly $2,600.
“I had a feeling there would be a bill,” Clark said. “But I didn’t know how much it would be, and I kind of feel bad for the fact that it’s so expensive. But I couldn’t just let the kid go — I had to do something.”
John Clark’s family is trying to make arrangements to get the bill paid.
Since this story first aired, many folks have come forward to pay the bill on behalf of the lifeguard.
I say, screw that….let the kid’s family who’s life was saved pay the bill. The lifeguard already did his part!
Should the lifeguard have to pay the bill for the emergency services required for the kid he saved?
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