What ACTUALLY Happens if someone in a hospital can’t pay their medical bill?
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That depends entirely on where the person is located.
For example, in Minnesota you are cared for until you are able to be safely discharged, then you get a bill. If that bill is not paid, it can go to collections, or potentially written off by the hospital as bad debt and never go to collections.
In the US, I believe there are laws against the refusal of emergency care, so you always will have that if you need it.
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If it’s a public / nonprofit hospital, it is [required by federal law to offer financial assistance,](https://money.usnews.com/money/personal-finance/spending/articles/what-to-know-about-hospital-financial-assistance-policies) which can erase 60% or more of the bill. This offer should be made by the hospital’s social worker assigned to the case before the patient leaves the hospital, or the patient can contact the patient care coordinator after receiving the bills.
I can relay what happened to me. I was hitchhiking from San Francisco to Las Vegas as a homeless person in the late 90’s. I had been in the hot sun for 2 days and had sunburns that basically covered my body. Ambulance took me to the hospital (I think it was in California still). They put cream all over my body and shot me up with Demerol. I’m completely out of it, like can barely stay awake when they realized I couldn’t pay and very quickly and quietly had security escort me to my belongings, help me dress and then put me out the front door.
In the United States of America you must provide lifesaving care, regardless of ability to pay. If a person gets out of the hospital and cannot pay the bill then that bill will eventually go to collections. Eventually, if a person doesn’t pay, they could have their paycheck garnished or be sued.
In very serious cases a person can go through a legal process known as “bankruptcy” where, to massively oversimplify, they essentially tell a court “I have no money and can never pay off these debts” and the court will lower the amount of those debts. It should be noted that bankruptcy is a very complicated procedure with a ton of drawbacks, so it’s not like a get out of jail free card.
This is, sadly, quite common. A 2019 [survey](https://files.kff.org/attachment/Report-KFF-LA-Times-Survey-of-Adults-with-Employer-Sponsored-Health-Insurance) by the Kaiser Family Foundation and LA Times found that *9%* of people who had health insurance through their employer had declared bankruptcy due to medical bills at some point in their life.
contrary ot what you may think, not evne the US youll be denied emergency care. you will be billed after the fact but you will be Treated.
now if said bill cannot be paid when it depends on where you are, some places send it to collections and deal with it there while other try to collect if its deemed not worth the effort thery discharge it as bad debt and write it off.
In Australia the Medicare system covers all Australians. If a patient does not have private health insurance or is admitted to a public hospital as a Medicare patient, the Commonwealth Government pays the cost of all the treatments.
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