Ohio’s Democratic candidate for governor has made medical debt forgiveness a central part of her campaign to flip the Buckeye State in the November general elections this year.
Dr. Amy Acton, a preventive medicine specialist and former state public health leader, has promised Ohioans that she will follow the lead of several other Democratic states in buying out medical debt should she be elected to the governorship against Republican challenger, billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy.
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Acton served in multiple administrations as Ohio’s chief public health officer before resigning in June 2020 after clashing with the state legislature regarding her advice to Republican Gov. Mike DeWine on COVID-era lockdowns. After her resignation, she served as DeWine’s health policy adviser in the governor’s office.
On the campaign trail, Acton has relied heavily on her health policy proposals, including the widely popular plank of medical debt relief, to sway voters who might otherwise be skeptical of her COVID-era policy recommendations.
Acton highlighted her plan to “end medical debt as governor” during a May 6 local news interview, telling the story of a family she met who had $300,000 of medical debt due to newborn twins needing to stay in the NICU before coming home.
“Every one of us is one healthcare emergency away from losing everything,” Acton said.
Democrats and Republicans have made addressing the rising costs of healthcare the central feature of their campaigns for the 2026 elections, as Americans consistently rank affording healthcare as a top concern.
Roughly 1 in 7 Ohioans had unpaid medical debts for 90 days or more in 2022, according to the Health Policy Institute of Ohio’s analysis last year.
But the data is a bit skewed following the 2023 decision of most major credit agencies to voluntarily stop reporting medical debt less than $500. About 62% of medical collections in 2020 were under $490, according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
The public collectively owes roughly $220 billion in medical debt, according to research by health policy organization KFF, published in 2024. Nearly 6 in 10 Americans have some form of medical debt that was either still outstanding or had been paid off in the past five years.
Acton told the local outlet Signal Ohio that her plan to forgive medical debt involves making a one-time payment, eliminating debt for Ohioans based on income requirements. Only those making at or below 400% of the federal poverty level, or $128,600 for a family of four, or those whose debt exceeds 5% of their household income, would be eligible for medical debt forgiveness.
Acton told the local news outlet last week the details of the plan would be clearer upon taking office, but she referenced the models set by Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a Democrat, who spent $10 million to forgive up to $1 billion in debt. Acton’s income caps are the same Pritzker and Illinois Democrats implemented earlier this year for medical debt forgiveness.
In Illinois, as well as Michigan and New Jersey, which also eliminated certain medical debt, state officials worked with the nonprofit organization Undue Medical Debt to support hospitals in consolidating debts that would otherwise be unpayable.
Democrat-led cities in Ohio have also settled medical debt for their residents at a fraction of the cost of the total debt owed.
Toledo erased more than $230 million in medical debt with $1.6 million in federal COVID-19 relief funds. Cleveland also used $1.9 million to cover $181 million in medical debt.
Acton’s medical debt forgiveness plan builds on a bipartisan bill introduced in the Ohio state House last year by state Reps. Michele Grim (D-Toledo) and Jean Schmidt (R-Loveland) that would cap the maximum interest rate on medical debt to 3% per year. That bill would also prevent healthcare providers from reporting medical debt to credit agencies, as well as prohibit wage garnishment for medical debt collections.
Other measures in Acton’s agenda to lower healthcare costs for Ohioans are launching “Ohio Rx,” a version of the Trump administration’s drug discount finding website, TrumpRx.gov.
“As governor, I will launch Ohio Rx, an online platform that will leverage Ohio’s purchasing power from its Medicaid single pharmacy benefit manager to drive down prescription drug prices for all Ohioans,” Acton’s website reads.
The Ohio Democrat also says she plans to advance legislation that would require health insurance plans to include out-of-pocket medication and health supply costs towards Ohioans’ health insurance deductibles.
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Acton said in the local news interview that these positions and others in her broader economic plan ought not be partisan issues.
“Everyday Ohioans, 95% of Ohioans, don’t care what party you are,” Acton said. “They want you working on great, affordable health care; they want housing, rent that’s affordable; they want great schools and workforce training; they want a great path for a job; they want to live in a place with a high quality of life.”
