Before dying from stage four ovarian cancer at age 38, New York mother Casey McIntyre arranged a final message that turned her personal loss into financial relief for tens of thousands of strangers across the United States. By December 2024, the viral memorial campaign created in her honor had raised millions of dollars. The money allowed non-profit organization Undue Medical Debt to erase more than $120 million (£90 million) in unpaid healthcare bills. McIntyre, a publishing executive who lived in Brooklyn with her husband, Andrew Gregory, and their young daughter, died in November 2023.
“To celebrate my life, I’ve decided to buy up medical debt and then destroy it,” read the message posted to her social media accounts after her death, as released by Undue Medical Debt. Before her death, she worked with her husband to create a debt jubilee fundraiser through Undue Medical Debt, which was formerly called RIP Medical Debt.
As donations continued to grow throughout 2024, the campaign reached another major milestone during the holiday season. In December 2024, Undue Medical Debt released a statement confirming that a second round of debt relief funded by McIntyre’s campaign had erased more than $75 million in medical debt. Combined with the first round, the total amount of canceled healthcare debt passed $120 million, helping tens of thousands of low-income families.
Because of illness, that awareness helped motivate her to assist people facing financial hardship.
Andrew Gregory said his late wife understood that she had more access to healthcare treatment than many other people. “Casey was profoundly grateful for the excellent care she received, but she was also furious about how unjust the American healthcare system is,” Gregory stated in press releases issued by Undue Medical Debt. “She wanted to make sure that others who were suffering wouldn’t have to carry the added burden of crippling debt.”