美国国家公共电台 NPR--7 years went by before an illegal rape kit bill was completely taken care of

7 years went by before an illegal rape¹ kit² bill was completely taken care of

Transcript³

More than 100 million people in the U.S. have medical debt, which can ruin credit and deplete⁴ savings⁵. One woman who was hounded for years by debt collectors for a bill she never should have gotten.

A MARTINEZ, HOST:

More than 100 million Americans have medical bills they cannot afford to pay. NPR and Kaiser Health News are looking at the consequences of those bills in an ongoing⁶ investigation⁷ into medical debt. We found patients with depleted⁸ savings, tarnished⁹ credit scores and, one of the most surprising things, patients who were never supposed to get a bill in the first place. Reporter Aneri Pattani has this story. And a warning - it contains information about sexual violence.

ANERI PATTANI, BYLINE¹⁰: Edy Adams was sexually assaulted in Illinois in 2013. At the hospital, a nurse told her she would not be charged for the rape kit. State law bans billing survivors¹¹. But two years later, Adams received a letter and then a call, a debt collector saying she owed the doctors who cared for her in the ER even though the physicians' group had gone out of business.

EDY ADAMS: So I was getting billed for a service I should not have even been charged for, that was, in fact, illegal to charge me for, by a company that no longer existed. And now I was being, like, hounded by debt collectors.

PATTANI: It turns out the physician group had sold Adams' debt to another company. Adams told the person on the phone that the bill was illegal. And they said they'd make a note of it. But a few months later, she got another call from a new company that had just bought her debt.

ADAMS: And so it just kept getting, like, passed around. And no one ever actually did the thing where they, like, made it go away. They just made it go away for them, not for me.

PATTANI: This went on for seven years. She started calling it her zombie bill. It just would not die. Each time a collector called about the bill for $130.68, Adams says she was brought back to her assault. That bill and that memory followed her everywhere.

ADAMS: This happened, like, when I was at work, when I was in class. It happened while I was driving once. I, like, literally¹² had to pull over because I would be, like, shaking.

PATTANI: Adams' zombie bill was kept alive by the debt industry, where unpaid¹³ medical bills are sold and resold for pennies on the dollar. Jerry Ashton co-founded a nonprofit to tackle this issue called RIP Medical Debt. He says a mistake in the original bill can get passed on for years. And mistakes are disturbingly common.

JERRY ASHTON: It can run from a minimum of a third of the bill to up to 80%, OK? So there's human error abounding¹⁴ in this.

PATTANI: To get those errors fixed¹⁵, Ashton says patients have to be as aggressive as the collectors. In Adams' case, asking people on the phone to put a note in her file never worked. She finally got frustrated¹⁶ and yelled at one of them. After that, her bill was reported to a credit bureau, where it damaged her credit score. She contacted the bureau and they were the ones to finally resolve the bill.

ADAMS: It really was, like, very cathartic¹⁷. But also, like, how much time had I wasted of my life, like, thinking about this?

PATTANI: It had taken Adams seven years to eliminate her bill for good.

(SOUNDBITE OF OLDTWIG AND LIME KAIN'S "DUNES")

MARTINEZ: That was Aneri Pattani with our partner, Kaiser Health News.

(SOUNDBITE OF OLDTWIG AND LIME KAIN'S "DUNES")

1 rape   

n.抢夺，掠夺，强奸；vt.掠夺，抢夺，强奸

参考例句：

• The rape of the countryside had a profound ravage on them.对乡村的掠夺给他们造成严重创伤。
• He was brought to court and charged with rape.他被带到法庭并被指控犯有强奸罪。

2 kit   

n.用具包，成套工具；随身携带物

参考例句：

• The kit consisted of about twenty cosmetic items.整套工具包括大约20种化妆用品。
• The captain wants to inspect your kit.船长想检查你的行装。

3 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

4 deplete   

v.弄空，排除，减轻，减少...体液，放去...的血

参考例句：

• Most native mammal species have been severely depleted.大多数本地哺乳动物的数量都已经大大减少了。
• Elastic collisions deplete very little of the electron's energy.弹性碰撞中电子减少的能量非常少。

5 savings   

n.存款，储蓄

参考例句：

• I can't afford the vacation,for it would eat up my savings.我度不起假，那样会把我的积蓄用光的。
• By this time he had used up all his savings.到这时，他的存款已全部用完。

6 ongoing   

adj.进行中的，前进的

参考例句：

• The problem is ongoing.这个问题尚未解决。
• The issues raised in the report relate directly to Age Concern's ongoing work in this area.报告中提出的问题与“关心老人”组织在这方面正在做的工作有直接的关系。

7 investigation   

n.调查，调查研究

参考例句：

• In an investigation,a new fact became known, which told against him.在调查中新发现了一件对他不利的事实。
• He drew the conclusion by building on his own investigation.他根据自己的调查研究作出结论。

8 depleted   

adj. 枯竭的, 废弃的 动词deplete的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• Food supplies were severely depleted. 食物供应已严重不足。
• Both teams were severely depleted by injuries. 两个队都因队员受伤而实力大减。

9 tarnished   

（通常指金属）（使）失去光泽，（使）变灰暗( tarnish的过去式和过去分词 )； 玷污，败坏

参考例句：

• The mirrors had tarnished with age. 这些镜子因年深日久而照影不清楚。
• His bad behaviour has tarnished the good name of the school. 他行为不轨，败坏了学校的声誉。

10 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

11 survivors   

幸存者，残存者，生还者( survivor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The survivors were adrift in a lifeboat for six days. 幸存者在救生艇上漂流了六天。
• survivors clinging to a raft 紧紧抓住救生筏的幸存者

12 literally   

adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实

参考例句：

• He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
• Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候，她不走到真正要昏厥了，决不肯坐下来。

13 unpaid   

adj.未付款的，无报酬的

参考例句：

• Doctors work excessive unpaid overtime.医生过度加班却无报酬。
• He's doing a month's unpaid work experience with an engineering firm.他正在一家工程公司无偿工作一个月以获得工作经验。

14 abounding   

adj.丰富的，大量的v.大量存在，充满，富于( abound的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• Ahead lay the scalloped ocean and the abounding blessed isles. 再往前是水波荡漾的海洋和星罗棋布的宝岛。 来自英汉文学 - 盖茨比
• The metallic curve of his sheep-crook shone silver-bright in the same abounding rays. 他那弯柄牧羊杖上的金属曲线也在这一片炽盛的火光下闪着银亮的光。 来自辞典例句

15 fixed   

adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的

参考例句：

• Have you two fixed on a date for the wedding yet?你们俩选定婚期了吗？
• Once the aim is fixed,we should not change it arbitrarily.目标一旦确定，我们就不应该随意改变。

16 frustrated   

adj.挫败的，失意的，泄气的v.使不成功( frustrate的过去式和过去分词 )；挫败；使受挫折；令人沮丧

参考例句：

• It's very easy to get frustrated in this job. 这个工作很容易令人懊恼。
• The bad weather frustrated all our hopes of going out. 恶劣的天气破坏了我们出行的愿望。 来自《简明英汉词典》

17 cathartic   

adj.宣泄情绪的；n.泻剂

参考例句：

• His laughter was cathartic,an animal yelp that brought tears to his eyes.他哈哈大笑以宣泄情绪，声音如野兽般尖厉，眼泪都笑出来了。
• The drug had a cathartic effect.这药有导泻的作用。