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https://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(09)00525-7/fulltext https://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(09)00525-7/fulltex... > The article by Himmelstein et a
by ajuc 2mo ago
https://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(09)00525-7/fulltext https://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(09)00525-7/fulltex...
> The article by Himmelstein et al1 in this issue of the The American Journal of Medicine documents that health care expenses were the most common cause of bankruptcy in the United States in 2007, accounting for 62% of US bankruptcies compared with 8% in 1981.2
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6366487/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6366487/
> Table 1 displays debtors’ responses regarding the (often multiple) contributors to their bankruptcy. The majority (58.5%) “very much” or “somewhat” agreed that medical expenses contributed, and 44.3% cited illness-related work loss; 66.5% cited at least one of these two medical contributors—equivalent to about 530 000 medical bankruptcies annually.
- wat10000 2mo ago"Medical expenses contributed" is awfully vague. Doesn't any expense contribute to bankruptcy? I'm more interested in the ~40% who didn't have medical expenses contribute. Are they not seeing doctors at all, or are they on a program that covers all medical expenses? I find this framing to be extremely misleading. "Medical bankruptcies" suggests something like someone gets cancer and insurance doesn't cover the treatment and they end up a million bucks in debt to the hospital. But the numbers above seem to cover someone who got fired, bet all their savings on black at the roulette table, and also visited the dentist.