FILE - The New York state Capitol is seen as Assembly members return after the regular legislative session ended to work on unfinished business in Albany, N.Y., Tuesday, June 20, 2023. Hospitals and other health care providers in New York would be banned from reporting medical debt to credit reporting agencies under a bill passed this week by the state's legislature.
ALBANY, N.Y. — Hospitals and other health care providers in New York would be banned from reporting medical debt to credit agencies under a bill passed this week by the state’s legislature — a measure intended to limit the damage that illness and injury can do to someone’s financial health. “Medical debt is different than other debt. It’s spontaneous. It doesn’t reflect someone’s credit worthiness,” said Assemblymember Amy Paulin, a Brooklyn Democrat., lawmakers have introduced legislation aimed at curtailing the financial burden that comes with medical debt. Some of those bills would keep medical debt from tanking credit scores and create medical debt relief programs, while other proposals would protect personal property from collections.
An estimated 100 million Americans have amassed nearly $200 billion in collective medical debt, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.