99 hospitals support state's medical debt relief plan: Governor

A new program overseen by the state’s health department will help eliminate medical debt for those struggling to pay their hospital bills in North Carolina and now has uniform support from hospitals.

Gov. Roy Cooper recently announced that all of the state’s 99 acute care hospitals will participate in an innovative new medical debt forgiveness program for low- and middle-income patients.

“We are excited to announce all of North Carolina’s 99 hospitals have signed up to participate in the program,” Cooper said. “This makes sense for the hospitals, their patients and their communities.”

Cooper said the move could forgive up to $4 billion for approximately 2 million North Carolina residents. Much of that is hospital debt. The program will use the state Medicaid system and federal money to encourage hospitals to waive past debts.

Locally, officials at UNC Health Nash are still learning how this complicated federal program will work, how it will affect the hospital and how those with medical debt will be forgiven.

“We recognize that medical debt is a serious issue for many patients, and we support efforts to ease that burden,” stated Ashley Flye, UNC Heath Nash spokeswoman. “Our teams are currently working on how we will implement this new medical debt plan. It’s a complex plan that requires additional time to fully understand and develop a way to operationalize it.”

By signing on to the plan, hospitals have committed to eliminating medical debt dating back to January 2014, for all Medicaid beneficiaries, as well as uncollectible medical debt for all patients with incomes at or below 350 percent of the federal poverty level. Past medical debt exceeding 5 percent of a person’s annual income will also be forgiven.

“Medical debt is a disease, plain and simple,” said N.C. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kody Kinsley. “It’s a debt that no one wants; no one chooses to have cancer, to get in a car accident or have a heart attack. It’s debt that, even after hospitals spend millions of dollars and years trying to collect, is rarely collected.”

Patients do not need to take any action to benefit from the new initiative.

According to media outlets, by July 2025, participating hospitals must forgive past Medicaid debt, implement policies to protect credit ratings and prevent aggressive debt collection as well as publicly post debt-relief policies.

Flye said that UNC Health Nash has its own medical debt relief program.

The UNC Health Financial Assistance Program helps relieve the financial burden of medically necessary health care services at participating UNC Health entities. The program is available to North Carolina residents with a household income at or below 250 percent of the federal poverty guideline.

Complete details about this programs can be seen on the website unchealth.org/records-insurance/financial-assistance-programs.