Her baby died at 2 days old. Now she can't escape hospital bills and debt collectors.

Lindsey Johnson is paying for her baby daughter’s birth, and death, on an installment plan.

At $75 a month, she will be free of the hospital bills sometime in early 2021. She would love to whip out a checkbook and cancel her debt to the Las Vegas hospital where she gave birth prematurely last April, but she doesn’t have the money. She has just one income now — she and her husband are divorcing.

“I’m going to pay it, and one day it will be gone,” said Johnson, who is 25 and lives in Boise. “The sooner it’s gone, the better. ... I just want it to go away.”

One of the facts about American health care is that you can have the worst tragedy of your life, then get billed for it. Sometimes, you also get a daily reminder from debt collectors.

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