Nickelodeon star Drake Bell reveals he no longer has health insurance through SAG-AFTRA due to 'eligibility' issues as he warns fans 'do not become an actor'

Nickelodeon star Drake Bell blasted SAG-AFTRA after learning that he no longer qualifies for health insurance after decades of work as an actor. 

The former child star, 40, took to his Instagram Stories on Tuesday with a screenshot of his declined coverage on the labor union's health plan website, and warned fans, writing, 'do not become an actor.'

The photo showed a message on the website that read, 'you do not qualify for Health Plan coverage at this time. Your reported covered earnings from July 2025-June 2026 did not meet minimum eligibility requirements, or you did not qualify other eligibility rules.'

The screenshot also showed that he had earned $17,480.53 and still needs to make  $11,452.47 more in order to qualify by reaching the $28,933 required for the SAG-AFTRA Health Plan.

The Drake & Josh star further wrote, 'Do not become an actor. Do not join SAG. You can work for 35 years and they still say [middle finger emoji].'  

He also tagged SAG-AFTRA and made a jab at the organization's president, Lord of the Rings star Sean Astin. 

'Really though Sean Astin you’re doing a bang up job,' Bell wrote. 'How about stop using actors to run things maybe?'

'They literally just know how to say words in front of a camera,' he added with the peace sign emoji.

The Daily Mail has reached out to representatives for Bell and SAG-AFTRA for comment.

His post comes weeks after The Princess Diaries actress Heather Matarazzo said she was at risk of losing her SAG-AFTRA health insurance, and after I Saw the TV Glow star Jack Haven made a plea for more work in order to qualify for insurance.

Matarazzo said she was 'literally in the same boat' as Haven adding, 'Lots of my fellow actors are.'

'I remember a time when we didn’t have to earn a minimum to qualify for insurance,' she added.

According to Entertainment Weekly, SAG members must earn at least $28,090 to get health insurance, with the minimum rising to $28,933 in 2027.

SAG-AFTRA represents approximately '160,000 actors, announcers, broadcast journalists, dancers, DJs, news writers, news editors, program hosts, puppeteers, recording artists, singers, stunt performers, voiceover artists and other media professionals' according to their website.

Last year, Bell hit out at the contract terms from his work with Nickelodeon, that he said have left him struggling to pay rent.

The actor, who was sentenced to one-year probation in 2021 after he admitted to endangering a 15-year-old girl, explained that despite the ongoing success of his show Drake & Josh, he was not living anything close to a life of luxury.

Having also starred in Nickelodeon's The Amanda Show, Bell revealed that he was given one-off payments for his work and does not receive residuals.

He told The Unplanned Podcast: 'That's the perception of the world, it's always been this way.'

'It's like, you know, "Oh, you made a Folgers Coffee commercial. You must live in a mansion in Hollywood. Like, I saw you on TV. You're rich."

'That's far from the case. And especially, which is the bummer for most of us on Nickelodeon, we don't get residuals for our shows.'

Bell said that had he been given a fair contract, he would still be benefiting from his work.

This is because residual checks, achieved through the sale of reruns, would allow him to still get paid for appearing in reruns of the hit shows, which he still features in.

The star is still recognizable to many after starring in the Drake & Josh show with Josh Peck from 2004 to 2007.

He said: 'The Friends cast at the peak was making a million dollars an episode. You make 13 episodes that year, you make $13,000,000. You make 20 episodes that year, you make $20,000,000, right?'

'But right now, each cast member of Friends just in syndication alone is making over $20,000,000 a year, and they're not filming a show every week.

'They're not going to work, but they're playing their show and they're using their likeness and they're doing all this, so they get paid for it.

'And they're making over $20,000,000 in a year just because other networks are buying the rights for syndication.'

The former child star, who also claimed to have been sexually abused on-set, described his financial situation as the result of the actions of 'evil people.'

Bell, who is also known for The Amanda Show and The Fairly OddParents, said: 'It's a lot of evil, corrupt people. That's the only thing, that is the answer. There's no other answer.'

'Do everything that they do to us mentally and emotionally, and then throw us to the wolves. And we're like, okay, cool. I got rent this month. There are three channels doing marathons.'

'Netflix just bought it, it's top 10 on Netflix, and I gotta figure out how to pay my rent this month.'

'And some fat cat with a cigar is just sitting up at the top of Viacom just going [chuckles]. What do you call it? It’s just like getting high on child labor.'

'People don't understand how the business works, the business side of this. They just see what the perception is on Instagram and social media and all the glitz and the glamour of Hollywood.

'We're putting in all of this work. This corporation is making billions with a 'B' off of us, and we're being compensated for the week of work, cool, but that's it.'

'And forever, in perpetuity, it literally says in the contract, across universes and galaxies and planets.'