(CAPITOL CITY NOW) – Illinois is announcing a medical debt milestone. After two years, the state has helped almost 700,000 people wipe out $1.4 billion in medical debt. A separate program in Cook County has erased another $1 billion for another 800,000 or so people.

“Only in America do we have a system in which an already frightening experience is made worse by taking on massive debt,” said Gov. JB Pritzker at an announcement Thursday morning in Chicago. “We punish people for circumstances that they never chose and could never have anticipated.”

Joining Pritzker at the news conference in Chicago was State Rep Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago). “I’ve been on hospital payment plans,” she said. “I’ve asked doctors if a test is really necessary, or if there is a cheaper way to get the answers we need. That shouldn’t be the case, and someone shouldn’t forgo health care because they fear debt.”

To be eligible, Illinoisans must have a household income at or below four times the federal poverty level, or their medical debt must equal at least five percent of their annual household income. The state’s program, in which each dollar the state invests retires $100 in debt, is through the nonprofit Undue Medical Debt.