Americans borrowed $74 billion last year to cover healthcare costs
West Health-Gallup survey finds millions worried about medical debt
2025-03-05
(Press-News.org) WASHINGTON, D.C. – March 5, 2025 – More than 31 million Americans (12%) report needing to borrow about $74 billion last year to pay for healthcare despite most having some form of health insurance, according to a new survey from West Health and Gallup. Nearly one-third (28%) report being “very concerned” that a major health event could throw them into debt.
The survey found almost 20% of Americans aged 49 and under needed to borrow money to cover medical costs compared with just 9% of those 50 to 64. Women between the ages of 50 and 64 were twice as likely as men in the same age group to say they had to borrow (12% vs. 6%). Two percent of Medicare-eligible adults (those over the age of 65) reported having to borrow.
“Too many Americans are racking up medical debt whether they have health insurance or not,” said Tim Lash, President, West Health Policy Center, part of West Health, a family of nonprofit organizations focused on healthcare and aging. “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.”
Black (23%) and Hispanic adults (16%) were significantly more likely to report having borrowed money than White (9%) adults. The biggest disparities were found among adults under the age of 50. Black adults aged 18-49 (29%) were the biggest borrowers followed by Hispanic adults (19%) and White adults (14%) in the same age range. Americans with children under the age of 18 were twice as likely to report borrowing compared to households with no children (19% vs. 8%).
Breakdown of Borrowing
Americans collectively borrowed about $74 billion to pay for healthcare last year, with more than half (58%) borrowing $500 or more and 41% borrowing $1,000 or more. Fourteen percent borrowed $5,000 or more.
Concerns Over Medical Debt Across Age, Race and Income
Most Americans (58%) report being at least somewhat concerned that a major health event could land them in debt, including 28% who say they are “very concerned.” Concerns span income levels, with more than six in 10 households with annual incomes under $120,000 worried. Fewer higher earners were concerned, but 40% of households making over $180,000 report they too have concerns.
Even with Medicare eligibility, more than half (52%) of people aged 65 or older say they are at least somewhat concerned they could go into medical debt if they suffered a major health event. Concerns also run high among Black adults (62%), Hispanic adults (63%) and women (62%). Only 14% of respondents say they are not concerned at all.
“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,” said Dan Witters, director of wellbeing research at Gallup. “These findings underscore the need for solutions that make healthcare more affordable for all Americans.”
Methodology
The West Health-Gallup Survey was conducted via web Nov. 11-18, 2024, with a nationally representative sample of 3,583 U.S. adults aged 18 and older. The margin of sampling error is ±2.1 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.
About West Health
Solely funded by philanthropists Gary and Mary West, West Health is a family of nonprofit and nonpartisan organizations that include the Gary and Mary West Foundation and Gary and Mary West Health Institute in San Diego and the Gary and Mary West Health Policy Center in Washington, D.C. West Health is dedicated to lowering healthcare costs to enable seniors to successfully age in place with access to high-quality and affordable health and support services that preserve and protect their dignity, quality of life and independence. Learn more at westhealth.org.
About Gallup
Gallup delivers analytics and advice to help leaders and organizations solve their most pressing problems. Combining more than 80 years of experience with its global reach, Gallup knows more about the attitudes and behaviors of employees, customers, students and citizens than any other organization in the world.
###
END
[Attachments] See images for this press release:
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
2025-03-05
A beloved Australian bird best known for its stunning tail and powers of mimicry may have a cunning hidden talent.
New research has revealed the superb lyrebird to be a resourceful farmer, creating micro-habitats to host and fatten its prey before returning later to feast.
Scientists from La Trobe University observed the ground-dwelling birds working to create habitats suitable for their diet of worms, centipedes and spiders.
In a new paper published in the Journal of Animal Ecology, the researchers found that lyrebirds arranged litter and soil on the forest floor in ways that promote more ...
2025-03-05
Recently, the research team led by Researcher WANG Guozhong from the Institute of Solid State Physics, the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has developed a method to precisely control the size of nickel particles in catalysts, improving their performance in hydrogenation reactions.
The related research results were published in Advanced Functional Materials.
Catalysts are essential in speeding up chemical reactions without being consumed, and the size of the metal particles in them plays a key role in their effectiveness. Larger particles have more high-coordination sites, while smaller ones are dominated ...
2025-03-05
Mineral scaling, a significant issue in membrane desalination, reduces water recovery rates and diminishes system performance. Gypsum and silica, are two prevalent types of scaling, each form through different processes—crystallization for gypsum and polymerization for silica. These formation mechanisms lead to contrasting behaviors: gypsum scaling, marked by rapid kinetics and intrusive crystal growth, causes pore wetting, while silica scaling forms highly adhesive, irreversible layers. The impact of these scales on desalination efficiency underscores the need for a deeper understanding of their formation and mitigation.
On October 20, ...
2025-03-05
When ‘Elephant’ toothpaste erupts from the science lab, history deals up Pokémon playing cards, and maths bakes a batch of chocolate brownies, it might seem like chaos.
Yet, a groundbreaking study from University of South Australia researchers, shows that creativity plays an essential role in academic success, suggesting that students who think outside the box are more likely to excel in literacy and numeracy assessments.
It’s an important finding, particularly when the most recent National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) data shows that one in three Australian students are behind in their numeracy ...
2025-03-05
Scientists from UNSW Sydney have located a potential new exoplanet – a planet that orbits a star outside of our solar system – using a technique known as ‘transit timing variation’.
In research highlighted in a new paper, published today in The Astrophysical Journal, Scientia Senior Lecturer Ben Montet and PhD candidate Brendan McKee analysed changes in the timing of a known planet’s transit across its star, to infer the presence of a second exoplanet.
After ...
2025-03-05
Ancient frog relatives survived the aftermath of the largest mass extinction of species by feeding on freshwater prey that evaded terrestrial predators, University of Bristol academics have found.
In the study, published today in the journal Royal Society Open Science, their findings suggest the amphibians’ success lay in their generalist feeding ecology, enabling them to feed on a wide variety of prey despite the array of environmental changes happening all around them through the Triassic. Broader examination of Triassic ecosystems also indicates that the freshwater habitats they preferred provided them with a relatively stable variety of food resources, allowing them ...
2025-03-05
Men’s semen quality is associated with how long they live according to a study of nearly 80,000 men, which is published today (Wednesday) in Human Reproduction [1], one of the world’s leading reproductive medicine journals.
The study followed the men for up to 50 years and found that those with a total number of motile sperm (sperm that can move or ‘swim’) of more than 120 million could expect to live two to three years longer than men with a total motile sperm count of between 0 and 5 million.
This is the largest study to examine the link between semen quality and mortality. An accompanying editorial ...
2025-03-05
RIVERSIDE, Calif. -- In a recent study, researcher Anandasankar Ray at the University of California, Riverside, and his team employed machine learning techniques combined with cheminformatics to predict novel mosquito repellents that could greatly improve global mosquito control efforts. Using the same approach to combat the global threat of mosquito-borne diseases such as malaria and dengue, Ray, the recipient of a $2.5 million, five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health, or NIH, will now work on identifying novel spatial mosquito repellents ...
2025-03-05
Psychosocial stress during pregnancy could lead to higher blood pressure during the first year postpartum according to research from Keck School of Medicine of USC.
The study, published in Hypertension and supported by the National Institutes of Health, investigated whether mothers who reported higher perceived stress and depressive symptoms during pregnancy, developed higher blood pressure in the four-year period after birth. The findings showed higher stress and depressive symptoms during pregnancy were associated with greater blood pressure during the first year postpartum, but associations diminished thereafter.
“Pregnancy ...
2025-03-05
Resistance or muscle strengthening exercise, using weights or the body itself, may be the best type of exercise for tackling insomnia in older age, suggests a pooled data analysis of the available research, published in the open access journal Family Medicine and Community Health.
Aerobic exercise or a mix of strength, aerobic, balance, and flexibility exercises also seem to be effective, the analysis indicates.
Sleep quality tends to decline with age. And up to 1 in five older adults has insomnia, ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
[Press-News.org] Americans borrowed $74 billion last year to cover healthcare costs
West Health-Gallup survey finds millions worried about medical debt
