Medical bills and gaps in health coverage are wreaking havoc on the finances of the middle class, say researchers who analyzed the bankruptcies of thousands of Americans.
Health issues were a factor in 62.1 percent of personal bankruptcies in 2007, finds a study just published online by the American Journal of Medicine.
But what criteria led authors Drs. David Himmelstein and Steffie Woolhandler, outspoken advocates for a single-payer health care in this country, and their colleagues to classify someone’s bankruptcy as a medical one?
Well, it’s a long list and one to think about when evaluating or citing the results. So (deep breath), here goes:
- The person had to say that “illness, injury or medical bills” was the specific reason for bankruptcy; or,
- Uncovered medical bills exceeded $5,000 or 10 percent of family income; or,
- The filer or spouse lost two or more weeks of work-related income due to injury or illness; or,
- The person tapped home equity to pay medical bills.
Whew!
What to do? The authors stop short of calling for a federal takeover of health coverage in the paper, but say, pointedly, that “medical impoverishment” is “almost unheard of” in other rich countries. A key difference, they write, is that those other places have some sort of national health insurance.
Speaking of money, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation funded the work.
