“They came here as volunteers and they died to let you lounge in your mahogany offices,” Prigozhin declared. Valery Gerasimov, calling them weak and incompetent, blaming them for the carnage. Yevgeny Prigozhin accused them of not providing him with munitions in the key battle for the eastern city of Bakhmut.Ī video in May showed him standing in front of the bloodied bodies of his slain troops yelling obscenities at Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and the chief of the General Staff Gen. Follow Maysoon Khan on Twitter.For months, the outspoken millionaire head of the Wagner private mercenary force bombarded Russia’s military leaders with expletive-ridden insults in a rift that has weakened the country’s forces amid the war in Ukraine. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Maysoon Khan is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. “This bill protects the right of New Yorkers to obtain the health care services they need without fear of having their credit records unfairly ruined.” “Medical debt is a serious problem that creates a crushing burden for many New Yorkers and unfairly undermines their financial security,” Chuck Bell, advocacy program director for nonprofit Consumer Reports, said in a statement. The bill would go into effect immediately if signed by Hochul, a Democrat. “There’s a concern that people could incur an amount of debt with no intention to pay it back, rather than the intended reasoning of the legislation to ensure people who need that critical care can get it without worrying the debt will follow them around forever,” said Jensen. Republican Assemblymember Josh Jensen, who voted against the bill, said that while there is a need to ensure emergency medical debt doesn’t haunt people, the legislation is too expansive and should not apply to non-emergency care. Some Republican lawmakers fear the legislation could have unintended consequences. New York’s legislation would impact about 740,000 adult New Yorkers and their families who had medical debt in collections on their credit reports as of February 2022, according to a study done by Urban Center, a think tank that conducts economic and social policy research. It doesn’t reflect someone’s credit worthiness,” said Assemblymember Amy Paulin, a Brooklyn Democrat.Īn estimated 100 million Americans have amassed nearly $200 billion in collective medical debt, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. “Medical debt is different than other debt. And unlike someone whose credit is damaged by reckless spending or a bad investment, people often find themselves hit with huge, unexpected medical bills simply because they’ve suffered from disease or injury. National credit reporting agencies had already voluntarily agreed to not report medical debts under $500, but advocates say additional protections are needed.Ī bad credit report often means difficulty renting a house, buying a car, or securing a loan. Kathy Hochul, the law would make New York the second state, after Colorado, to prohibit medical debt from being collected by credit reporting agencies or included in a credit report. (AP) - Hospitals and other health care providers in New York would be banned from reporting medical debt to credit agencies under a bill passed this week by the state’s legislature - a measure intended to limit the damage that illness and injury can do to someone’s financial health. By MAYSOON KHAN (Associated Press/Report for America)ĪLBANY, N.Y.
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