>The city is working with RIP Medical Debt, a nonprofit that buys medical debt in bulk from hospitals and debt collectors for pennies on the dollar.

I read it as $18m invested = $2b of debt for 500k people, as they seem to get a discount for buying the debt in bulk. Could always be more though :)

Election year. Just take it with a grain of salt. What is reported and what actually happens is alway very different. Plus it is democrats controlled, money generally assumed by them to grow on trees or rain from sky.