Kentucky Forgives Medical Debt For 130,000 People

In September 2020, Brittany Gurney's 14-month-old son Jaxon was rushed to the hospital in Mesa, Arizona with a bowel obstruction requiring nine surgeries over three months, leaving her facing her portion of a $2 million bill: $15,000 she knew she could not pay. She sent $50 a month when she could, the debt went to collections, her credit score fell 300 points, and then earlier this year a letter arrived. It said her remaining debt had been forgiven. "I thought it was fake," she said. It was not — the letter came from Undue Medical Debt, the nonprofit that partners with states to buy bundles of medical debt from collectors at pennies on the dollar, then instead of collecting, simply sends the person who owed it a letter telling them it is gone. "One dollar gets rid of $100 of medical debt," said CEO Allison Sesso. "People not believing the letter is one of the biggest problems we have. If you get one of these letters, believe it. It's real."

The model is spreading quickly, with Kentucky becoming the latest state to act after Governor Andy Beshear announced in September that the state would spend $2.5 million to cancel medical debt for 130,000 people, and Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs committing $10 million of unused pandemic relief funds to do the same, with Gurney herself standing beside her at the announcement. New Jersey, Illinois, Delaware, and Connecticut have all run similar programs, with total debt erased across state programs now surpassing $4 billion. Americans owe an estimated $220 billion in medical debt, with up to 100 million people carrying unpaid bills, and each letter is one small piece of a very large problem being solved one state at a time. Jaxon, six years after his emergency, is healthy.

Source:https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2026/10/02/medical-debt-relief