Jun 4, 2019 - Health
The charity eradicating medical debt
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
Nonprofit charity R.I.P. Medical Debt, which buys and absolves people’s health care debt in bulk, has wiped away $700 million since its inception in 2014 — and that number should hit $1 billion later this year, co-founders Jerry Ashton and Craig Antico told me.
How it works: R.I.P. Medical Debt rose to fame in 2016 after it helped comedian John Oliver forgive $15 million of medical debt.
- Hospitals pursue patients' bills, occasionally threatening legal action, but if they think it's a lost cause, they sell the uncollected debt to debt buyers for pennies on the dollar.
- Debt buyers become the new collectors, and they "get very aggressive," said Ashton, who used to work in the bill collections industry but now calls himself a "predatory giver."
- R.I.P. Medical Debt jumps in and buys the debt from the debt buyers using donated funds, and immediately abolishes the debt.
- The organization focuses on the poor: debtors have to earn less than twice the federal poverty level, are insolvent, or have medical debt that makes up at least 5% of their annual income.
What they're saying: "There's no such thing as great health insurance," Ashton said. "If you and I think this paper-thin safety net of insurance is going to save us, that's not going to be the case."
Go deeper: "A drop in the bucket" of medical debt
