In another diary a commenter disagreed with the notion that "everyone in the United States uses healthcare." I agree with this conclusion on its face, but it doesn't matter in the case before the Supreme Court, I posit, on account of fugitives.
While it is true some people live and die without ever seeing a doctor, that fact probably will not survive as an argument against the mandate, and here's why.
I'm certainly not competent to be dispositive of a legal issue in this area, but I am familiar with the same legal principle in a different area of law, and legal concepts tend to have tendrils.
In U.S. Customs trade law, commodities are often classified for duty purposes in accordance with their "chief use." In determining that use, there are sometimes several uses that compete in the legal determination of chief use. However, there are some uses that occur so statistically infrequently, that they are considered "fugitive uses." Fugitive uses are completely disregarded in the legal determination of what constitutes the chief use.
As a hypothetical example I'll use an incident of which I'm aware, that while not part of any formal legal determination, still fits the situation to a pee. A U.S. Customs associate of mine with a child still in diapers was on a road trip when his radiator hose burst. He took one of his daughter's diapers - the kind with the absorbent crystals inside - and wrapped it tightly around the radiator hose. When he started the engine again, the diaper quickly swelled and sealed off the leak enough that he could make it to the next town for repairs.
Now, in that instance the diaper was essentially an auto part. But you wouldn't classify it as an auto part for tariff classification purposes if the classification were based on chief use, because its use as an exigency auto part was a "fugitive use," as far as the tariff laws are concerned. By the way it wouldn't be a bad idea to carry one of these things in the trunk, infant or no. Bladder safe than sorry.
I would say that in this country those who never uses the health care system in their entire life are "fugitives" from the healthcare system. People who never get sick are extremely rare, and in fact most of us at the very least wind up in an ambulance, even if it is to haul our dead body to a hospital, medical expenses being incurred in both the ambulance and the emergency room of the hospital. Not sure whether payments to medical examiners are considered "medical" or not. At any rate you see the point.
Which is not to say that a fugitive use and a fugitive's use are the same thing. As we know, actual fugitives from justice need only be caught in order to receive free medical care - no copays, no deductibles, no refusal for pre-existing conditions, no being dropped if you get cancer, etc., an admirably humane, yet curious result in a society that apparently values the unfortunate plight of incarcerated criminals more than it does the inability of law-abiding citizens to obtain healthcare despite honest hard work.