31 million Americans borrowed money for health care last year: Poll

More than 31 million Americans borrowed money last year to pay for health care, a new survey found.

Those Americans borrowed about $74 billion, despite most of them have some form of health insurance, the West Health-Gallup survey found.

Most of the borrowers were ages 18-29, 30-39 and 40-49. Just two percent of Americans who borrowed were over 65 years old.

“Too many Americans are racking up medical debt whether they have health insurance or not,” Tim Lash, West Health Policy Center president, said in a statement. “A high-priced healthcare system that requires Americans to take out loans or make painful tradeoffs just to stay healthy is in desperate need of policy reform or things will get even worse.”

The survey found that Black and Hispanic Americans were “significantly” more likely to have borrowed than white adults.

Twenty-three percent of Black respondents said they borrowed for health care over the last year, while 16 percent of Hispanic adults borrowed. Just 9 percent of white adults borrowed funds for healthcare.

Most Americans, 58 percent, say they are at least somewhat concerned that a major health event will put them in debt. The survey noted that the concerns span income levels.

“It is clear that high healthcare costs continue to burden the American people, and financial insecurity around care is not limited to any one demographic,” Dan Witters, director of wellbeing research at Gallup, said in a statement.

The West Health-Gallup survey was conducted Nov. 11-18, 2024, among 3,583 respondents and has a margin of error of 2.1 percentage points.

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