GIVING BACK

Two Women Erased $1.5 Million of Strangers’ Medical Debt

With the help of a debt-forgiveness charity.

Last year, 80-year-old Judith Jones and 70-year-old Carolyn Kenyon learned about R.I.P. Medical Debt–which purchases bundles of past-due medical bills to help those in need—and decided to give back. The women, who are both from Ithaca, New York, started a fundraising campaign of their own to assist people with medical debt. In just three months, they raised $12,500 and sent it to the debt-forgiveness charity, which purchased a portfolio of $1.5 million of medical debts on their behalf.

“We tried to get people interested in the seriousness of medical debt and lead them to understand that when the New York Health Act passes, that will be the end of medical debt, because everyone will be covered,” Jones told The New York Times. With the help of these two women, over 1,284 New Yorkers have had their debts forgiven, R.I.P. Medical Debt said.