In what sort of third-world hellhole does someone need to start a donation drive so they can afford to donate a kidney to a friend in need?

California.

To be perfectly clear, the actual medical expenses are covered. It’s her living expenses & lost wages while she recovers that she needs. This isn’t trivial stuff, this is major surgery, and she needs to pay her bills.

For some batshit stupid reason people in the United States have decided that having systems in place to ensure that people’s basic needs are taken care of is somehow evil. This means that people can very quickly wind up in desperate straits.

I’ve seen people point to projects like this and say, in effect, “Look, they’ve got it taken care of, see? Public healthcare programs are unnecessary” which misses the point completely. Internet donation drives like this are symptoms of social problems, not solutions. They can’t ensure that people will have their basic needs covered, they can only provide a chance for those with the resources and savvy to start one.

There are a lot of donation drives to help with medical issues on the internet, which makes me wonder how many more people are in similar situations but suffering in silence.