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In my experience most of the American expats who talk about how great the healthcare system is in other countries are almost always young people who don't have to deal with catastrophic problems or manage long-term conditions, and if they did wouldn't have had a comparable experience back in the US. I remember one former coworker who was living in France brag about how he went to the doctor for some minor ailment and was only charged ten dollars and got a prescription that only cost a few bucks. Well, that's pretty much how it works in the US if you have any kind of insurance at all that isn't an absolute bottom-feeder. I had cellulitis about a decade ago and that's pretty much how it was at urgent care, they gave me a bunch of prescriptions that were so inexpensive the OTC probiotic the doctor recommended was more expensive than all of them combined. For more serious ailments the usual story is that you go in and don't pay anything up front and then in a few months the insurance company sends you a bill that's more than you think you should pay based on your understanding of the policy but not enough that it causes any financial hardship or is worth complaining about. So like a few hundred dollars.
When it comes to medical bankruptcies, I practiced bankruptcy law for a while and they aren't what you think they are. While you occasionally see someone who was uninsured and now owes a hospital $60 grand or something, that's pretty rare. What's more common is that a relatively low-income person has insurance but an injury or illness keeps them out of work for an extended period and they're forced to borrow to pay for expenses. These people aren't likely to have short-term disability insurance, and long-term disability from Social Security doesn't kick in until after they've been out of work for a year (though they get paid from the date they stopped work), and takes a while to process. By the time they get their disability payments or are back to work they're so far in a hole that bankruptcy is the best option. They usually have a lot of unpaid medical bills that are included in the bankruptcy, but that's not the driving force.
Good points, you try to bring these up anywhere else like reddit or hacker news and get downvoted to oblivion.
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