With Medical Debt Burdening Millions, a Financial Regulator Steps In to Help

(By Noam N. Levey for KFF Health News)

When President Barack Obama signed legislation in 2010 to create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, he said the new agency had one priority: “looking out for people, not big banks, not lenders, not investment houses.”

Since then, the CFPB has done its share of policing mortgage brokers, student loan companies, and banks. But as the U.S. health care system turns tens of millions of Americans into debtors, this financial watchdog is increasingly working to protect beleaguered patients, adding hospitals, nursing homes, and patient financing companies to the list of institutions that regulators are probing. Continue reading here…

Kaiser Health News is a nonprofit national health policy news service that is part of the nonpartisan Henry J Kaiser Family Foundation.

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