Injured and Bankrupted
By Ka Lee Angel Lee
“Bankruptcy is a federal law whereby a person’s assets are turned over to a trustee and used to pay off outstanding debts; this usually occurs when someone owes more than they have the ability to repay.” According to recent researches, the states personal bankruptcy filings this year totaled 1.4 million to 1.5 million. Major studies in these years indicated that medical bills contributed most in personal bankruptcies in the US. Data indicated that about 62 percent of these filings would be medical. However among these victims, 75% of them owned health insurance in the first place.
Fallouts of bankruptcy are impacting severely families and businesses financially. The status is printed on credit reports and this jeopardizes obtaining housing and getting jobs. In the long run, these victims are suffering from loss of medical care, utility shutoffs and starvation even.
The researches called on health care reform because the high health care costs are crushing many families and small businesses. Health care costs rise about twice the rate of inflation. It was also said that many people’s medical insurance was not sufficient and efficient enough to cover appropriate costs to prevent bankruptcy. Nevertheless, insurance costs also rise while benefits offered went down these years. Related departments should take a serious look at the insurance policies and govern the efficiency of health insurance to protect the public.

Sources:

http://prescriptions.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/07/insured-but-bankrupted-anyway/

http://www.thefranklinnewspost.com/article.cfm?ID=14436

http://ezinearticles.com/?A-Complete-Guide-to-Medical-Bankruptcy&id=1222493