February 25, 2009 9:42AM # The Truth about Medical Bankruptcies By [Michael D. Tanner](https://www.cato.org/people/michael-d-tanner) --- SHARE During [his speech to Congress](http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/02/obama_address_to_congress.html) last night, President Obama declared that health care costs “causes a bankruptcy in America every thirty seconds.” His numbers are just a little bit off. If what President Obama said were true, there would be approximately 1.05 million health care related bankruptcies in this country every year. However, in 2007 (the last full year for which there is [data](http://www.abiworld.org/AM/TemplateRedirect.cfm?template=/CM/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=51740) available, there were a total of only 815,000 non-business bankruptcies nationwide. Moreover, according to a [study](http://www.gsm.ucdavis.edu/uploadedFiles/Faculty/Directory_and_Profiles/personal_bank.pdf) by Dr. Ning Zhu at UC-Davis, only 5 percent of bankruptcies are caused by medical bills. That suggests that in 2007 there were about 41,000 health care related bankruptcies. Too many, to be sure, but a far cry for 1.05 million. Haven’t we learned from those weapons of mass destruction in Iraq that facts matter when a president says we absolutely have to do something now? ##### Related Tags [Health Care](https://www.cato.org/health-care) [![Creative Commons License](/build/cato_2020/images/creative-commons.svg)](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/).