Most uninsured Americans can't pay their hospital bills, the U.S. Department of Health said Tuesday in a bid to bolster support for the Obama administration's year-old health reform legislation.

The agency said it was debunking what it calls an "enduring myth" of U.S. health care: that the uninsured can get good care.

"Nothing could be farther from the truth," HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a statement.
In the report shared Tuesday, the HHS said on average, uninsured families can only afford to pay for 12 percent of hospitalizations. Even somewhat better off uninsured families --- those making above 400 percent of the Federal Poverty Line, which would equal about $89,400 according to 2011 guidelines for a family of four --- can only pay for about one-third of hospitalizations.

That's largely because the uninsured lack much in the way of savings. The median assets for the uninsured are only $20. Even somewhat more comfortably off uninsured families still have little socked away. The median family assets for uninsured families earning more than 400 percent over the FPL total only $4,100. (For families, 200 to 399 percent over the FPL, median assets are a paltry $300. For families 200 percent above the FPL and under, the median assets are zero.)

Every year, about 2 million uninsured Americans are hospitalized, the HHS said. About 50 million Americans are uninsured. For these patients, the majority of hospital stays cost more than $10,000.

To put the problem in perspective, the HHS compared the risks of hospitalization for the uninsured to other somewhat common dangers, such as a car crash. The agency said that while car crashes are about 50 percent more common, they're also, on average, less costly. While the yearly risk for a hospitalization of an uninsured person is 3 percent and the annual risk of a car crash is 4.6 percent, the average hospital bill is two and a half times higher than the average costs of an automobile accident ($22,200 versus $8,552).

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