If an active duty soldier chooses to purchase private healthcare insurance, is it punishable by UCMJ?

Legally, other health insurances won't cover active duty troops. I don't know why anyone would say that's punishable by UCMJ, but if you ever talk to an insurance company they'll tell you that they are not allowed to cover service members. This very same question came up because my wife has excellent Healthcare insurance and asked about covering me under hers for things that Tricare may not cover in some areas like chiropractor. Apparently it's written into the law somewhere that they are prohibited, which means that you can purchase it, just not for yourself

You can have other health insurance but they will not cover you for military related injuries. I had a Soldier that used private insurance for a few different things. He ended up popping hot on a UA due to the Meds for a surgery. He just gave our BDE Surgeon the medical records and he was cleared. There was no issue with it. He hurt his ankle on a ski trip and he wanted to use a private doctor so he jumped on a family plan with his parents and paid for it. In reality if you got your own insurance and used it outside the military you should be fine.

You are misinterpreting the statement on the website. Tricare isn’t the military and tricare has no ability to punish you. What the statement means is that active duty can’t use other versions of care via Tricare such as Tricare select/standard/etc.

With that said I would recommend against it because private healthcare is quite expensive. Especially on E5 pay. Tricare covers emergency care so if you don’t want to go to sickcall you can always go to the local ER.