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Health Care Tue Dec 22 2009
Chicago Reporter: Medical Bills Spurring More Bankruptcies
The Chicago Reporter's Amalia Oulahan details how medical bills continue to trigger more and more bankruptcies:
An examination of 2,314 personal bankruptcy cases found that medical expenses caused an estimated 62 percent of the bankruptcies filed nationwide in 2007, according to an August study published in the American Journal of Medicine. In the same year, more than 40,000 nonbusiness bankruptcy cases were filed in Illinois, according to the American Bankruptcy Institute.
The study's result, compared with findings from a similar 2001 study, shows that the share of bankruptcies caused by illness and medical bills increased by almost 50 percent between 2001 and 2007.
Of the medical bankruptcies studied in 2007, three quarters of the filers had health insurance when they became sick. "For most people, the issue is that they have insurance but it's nearly worthless," said Dr. David Himmelstein, associate professor of medicine at Harvard University and one of the study's authors. "You have this insurance card, but it still leaves you with bills."
Consider this a shout out to my "personal responsibility" friends out there who think the working class is in so much credit trouble because they're buying Dodo egg-yolk fueled ski-doos and genital-massage equipped flatscreens.
In retrospect, I should've continued my COBRA coverage.
conor / December 22, 2009 9:40 PM
wait a second, they have genital-massage equipped flat screens?
also - this is a good example of why we do need reform, but it doesn't mean we need THIS reform. (I'm referring to that which the democrats are currently pelvic thrusting through the legislative process)