Most Bankruptcies caused by Medical Bills

Outrageous Stories

This is an amazing number, and hopefully will be one thing addressed by any health care reform: in America 62% of people who are declaring bankruptcy are having to do it because of their medical bills.

Are all of these people without health insurance?

No.

Fully 75% of them do have health insurance, but needed costly measures that weren’t covered in their policy.

This New York Times article tells of a computer security specialist who had to go to the hospital and found that most of his treatment was excluded by his insurance. He and his wife had to declare bankruptcy.

Or look at the case of a middle-class couple who had to declare bankruptcy after she had breast cancer and he had bypass surgery, on this CBS The Early Show with Harry Smith. Their health insurance only covered about 10% of the bills.

The first thing we need to do is read the fine print of our health insurance policies!

If they are not enough to cover a catastrophic accident or critical illness, we need some additional insurance to cover those catastrophes.