RomneyCare Didn’t End Medical Bankruptcies

Surprise surprise. Getting everyone insurance is not enough to eliminate medical bankruptcies. (h/t Susie)

To gauge whether healthcare reform in Massachusetts had eased bankruptcies, the researchers looked at a random sample of Massachusetts bankruptcy filers in July 2009, sending surveys to almost 500 households. They compared their results to national and Massachusetts data collected in 2007, before the Massachusetts reform was implemented in 2008.

They found that while the percentage was down slightly, medical bills still contributed to 52.9% of all bankruptcies in the state. Absolute numbers of medical bankruptcies were up by a third. Total bankruptcies in Massachusetts went up 51% between 2007 and 2009.

Families still faced substantial medical debt, they wrote, because healthcare costs continued to rise.

Who could have known?

Lucky for us we may never get to the point where national health care reform fails to prevent medical bankruptcies, since the TeaPartiers seem intent on crashing our economy but good because they don’t think the US should have to pay for Bush’s unfunded wars.

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4 replies
  1. MadDog says:

    …Lucky for us we may never get to the point where national health care reform fails to prevent medical bankruptcies, since the TeaPartiers seem intent on crashing our economy but good because they don’t think the US should have to pay for Bush’s unfunded wars.

    Or as Repugs have been known to say: “Back in line peons ’cause we’re making the US government go first.”

    And the Repugs say that about bankruptcies, forcing folks to jump off a cliff, and of course, the demise of their hostages.

  2. rosalind says:

    and the latest obesity report a harbinger of increased costs to come to our health care system. this sentence really stopped me in my tracks:

    Today, the state with the lowest obesity rate would have had the highest rate in 1995,” says Dr Jeff Levi (executive director, TFAH) in a statement [2]. “There was a clear tipping point in our national weight gain over the past 20 years, and we can’t afford to ignore the impact obesity has on our health.”

    (emphasis mine)

  3. earlofhuntingdon says:

    ‘Tis a pity Washington keeps droning on about the need to help the medical insurance industry – which is only about money, billions and billions of it – and ignores the need for greater access to health care – which is about people’s lives and well-being.

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