California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta announced Monday that he is throwing his weight behind legislation to bar medical debt from showing up on consumer credit reports, a Democratic-led effort to offer protection to patients squeezed by healthcare bills. Bonta is a sponsor of Sen. Monique Limón’s bill, SB 1061, which seeks to block healthcare providers, as well as any contracted collection agency, from sharing a patient’s medical debt with credit reporting agencies.
Bonta said he’s not sure what sort of opposition to the bill to expect, but he wonders whether providers and collection agencies will be resistant. A KFF Health News analysis found that credit reporting threats are the most common collection tactic used by hospitals to get patients to pay their bills. A hospital, for example, might be concerned that a credit score ban might make it more difficult to get patients to pay for medical care they have already received. The three largest U.S.