NEW YORK — Unexpectedly high medical bills are common in the United States, but there are ways to get relief. According to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, one in five Americans are affected by outstanding medical debt, for a total cost of $88 billion.
In a 2022 study, the bureau found that roughly 20% of U.S. households report that they have medical debt, with collections appearing on 43 million credit reports. As of the second quarter of 2021, 58% of all bills in collections on credit records were medical bills.
Medical debt affects households unevenly, too, according to the agency. Past-due bills are more prevalent among Black and Hispanic people than white and Asian people, and medical debt is more common in the Southern…
