

Before the enactment of the 1954 Code, these travel expenditures were usually deductible in full. Taxpayers often move to a different place-typically from a cold climate to a warmer one-in order to alleviate a medical condition. How do these differences impact on the deduction? Third, Patient incurs expenses not for her own health, but for the health of others. Second, there is no consultation, diagnosis or treatment by a licensed medical professional, nor are there prescription drugs administered. First, the patient leaves her home and stays away for fourteen days. Self-quarantining is different in at least three respects. Patient pays the doctor’s fee, and pays for the prescription drugs. She consults with a licensed medical professional, who diagnoses and treats her condition, perhaps with prescription drugs. Consider the quintessential medical expense. To analyze medical quarantining under current tax law, it is helpful to determine how it is different from other, clearly deductible medical expenses. Can Taxpayer deduct the fourteen days of meals and lodging as a medical expense?

5 In order to protect society in general and Taxpayer’s household in particular, she spends the fourteen days in a nearby hotel. 3 In either event, Taxpayer self-quarantines for fourteen days, 4 pursuant to government guidelines. 2 Alternatively, she has just returned home from an international trip. To take a more real-world example, Taxpayer recently came in close contact with someone who has tested positive for the COVID-19 virus. Are the expenses of her self-quarantine deductible as medical expenses? 1 In fact, her motivation is solely for the medical well-being of others, not herself. Accordingly, she self-quarantines in the Ice Palace.

If she touches another person, or even merely flutters her hands carelessly in that person’s direction, that person will be frozen. The Snow Queen, who is in otherwise perfect health, has an unfortunate disability.
