Friday, June 28, 2024

California Today: L.A. County aims to eliminate medical debt for 150,000 residents

The county is investing $5 million to partner with a nonprofit and wipe out $500 million in debt for residents. The program is expected to start later this year.
California Today

June 28, 2024

It's Friday. L.A. County plans to eliminate medical debt for 150,000 residents. Plus, California's largest affordable housing bond makes it to the November ballot.

People in scrubs and face masks surround a person on a stretcher.
Nurses and doctors treat a patient arriving at a hospital emergency room near San Diego.  Etienne Laurent/EPA, via Shutterstock

Thirty-six percent of Californians have medical debt, owed to a doctor's office, a hospital, a collections agency or a credit card company. That financial burden can lead people to delay or forgo necessary medical care.

Los Angeles County just took a step to change that.

The county, by far the most populous in the nation with nearly 10 million people, plans to start buying up and forgiving the medical debt of some of its poorest residents. The county board of supervisors voted this week to spend $5 million to partner with Undue Medical Debt, a national nonprofit. The program is expected to start later this year.

"No one should be driven into poverty because they got sick," Janice Hahn, a member of the board of supervisors, said in a statement, adding that she believed L.A. County had a "moral obligation" to help debt-stricken families.

The county joins a growing list of places with similar forgiveness programs, including the state of Arizona, New York City, New Orleans and Washington, D.C.

L.A. County residents owed a total of $2.9 billion in medical debts in 2022, the most recent year for which data was available.

Typically, hospitals with unpaid patient bills sell the debt at a discount to collection agencies, which try to recoup the money for profit. By contrast, when Undue Medical Debt buys unpaid bills, it cancels the debt entirely.

The nonprofit says it can erase an average of $100 in face value of debt for every dollar that is donated to the group. L.A. County officials say the $5 million invested by the county could allow the group to eliminate $500 million in residents' medical debts and help 150,000 Angelenos completely erase what they owe. (Approximately 800,000 county residents have medical debt.)

There isn't much research evaluating how relieving medical debt affects individuals. One of the first studies on the topic, published in April as a working paper by the National Bureau of Economic Research, found that medical debt relief didn't improve the mental health or credit scores of debtors, on average, my colleague Sarah Kliff wrote.

That could be because the people getting the relief also have so many other unpaid bills that erasing one doesn't make a significant difference. Or it could be because the major credit reporting agencies removed unpaid medical debts smaller than $500 from credit reports last year, so relief of those debts would have little impact. (The Biden administration has proposed rules that would remove medical bills entirely from credit reports.)

When the study was published, the executive director of Undue Medical Debt, Allison Sesso, said the research contradicted what the nonprofit had heard directly from people it had helped. And she said that the organization's approach had changed since the study's experiment ended in 2020. It has started buying debt directly from hospitals, rather than from collections agencies, she said, so that the debts will be erased sooner, before they have a prolonged negative impact.

L.A. County officials said the partnership with the nonprofit was part of a larger strategy to address medical debt. They said they planned to work with health insurance companies and hospitals to understand how they charge patients and calculate debt. And they plan to offer expanded legal aid services to residents and make it easier for people to apply for financial assistance through the county.

"We don't want to be coming back to you in five years, trying to pay off medical debt again," L.A. County's public health director, Barbara Ferrer, said at the board of supervisors' meeting this week. "We want to pay it off and then we want to move forward — without people who don't have economic means continuing to accrue this level of debt."

We hope you've enjoyed this newsletter, which is made possible through subscriber support. Subscribe to The New York Times.

Toni Atkins sitting in front of the state flag of California.
State Senator Toni Atkins is running to succeed Gov. Gavin Newsom. Gregory Bull/Associated Press

The rest of the news

  • Toni Atkins, a Democrat and former legislative leader running to succeed Gov. Gavin Newsom, may have violated campaign finance laws by sending more than $22,000 from her campaign to a company owned by her spouse, Politico reports. A spokesperson for the Atkins campaign disputed that interpretation and told Politico the senator had done nothing wrong.
  • A heat wave next week is expected to send temperatures across the state soaring to their highest levels so far this year, with many locations seeing temperatures as high as 20 degrees above average, The San Francisco Chronicle reports.
  • State lawmakers rejected a measure to provide unemployment insurance benefits to striking academic workers over objections to the pro-Palestinian demonstrations on University of California campuses, Politico reports.

Southern California

  • The rapper Killer Mike has completed his community service requirement and will not face charges for an altercation with a security guard at the Grammys on the same night he won three awards.

Northern California

  • A Tesla plant in the Bay Area must resolve its air quality issues after accruing more than 100 violations for allegedly releasing toxic emissions over the past five years, CBS reports. Tesla did not respond to the news outlet's request for comment.

WHAT WE'RE EATING

And before you go, some good news

JD Flannel Donuts and Coffee in San Juan Capistrano may seem inconspicuous, but it was just named California's best doughnut shop by Yelp, SFGate reports. Offering monthly flavors on the menu, JD Flannel has a unique selection ranging from vanilla cake doughnuts to Mexican chocolate churro.

The shop was also deemed the third-best doughnut shop in all of America and Canada by Yelp last year.

Thanks for reading. I'll be back on Monday. Enjoy your weekend. — Soumya

P.S. Here's today's Mini Crossword.

Halina Bennet and Briana Scalia contributed to California Today. You can reach the team at CAtoday@nytimes.com.

Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox.

Need help? Review our newsletter help page or contact us for assistance.

You received this email because you signed up for California Today from The New York Times.

To stop receiving California Today, unsubscribe. To opt out of other promotional emails from The Times, including those regarding The Athletic, manage your email settings. To opt out of updates and offers sent from The Athletic, submit a request.

Subscribe to The Times

Connect with us on:

facebooktwitterinstagram

Change Your EmailPrivacy PolicyContact UsCalifornia Notices

LiveIntent LogoAdChoices Logo

The New York Times Company. 620 Eighth Avenue New York, NY 10018

No comments:

Page List

Blog Archive

Search This Blog

The Gun Price Is Right Ep. 5

 DEALS     ENTER TO WIN     SHOP NOW  ...