Student Debt For Dentists In USA-”Like Pulling Teeth”

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Opanin Gyammi finds himself in a very regular scenario;wearing a blue surgeons mask he pulls out a decaying tooth of a patient called Larry Butler, otherwise known as prison patient J22312.

Every day the 71 year old dentist goes to the state prison in Vacaville, working a long way past his age of retirement. He dreams of retiring and hanging up his drill for a quite life, but he cannot stop work and retire as he is still trying to pay off his student loan.

Opanin borrowed $50,000 during the 1980’s and ignored notices of payment and now he owes them over $500,000 because of penalizations and interest. The Justice Department then took him to court and now $3000 a month from his wages goes straight to them. He knows he is responsible for making some wrong decisions but he is not the only one. Student-loan debt in America is now over $1 trillion and leaders in Washington are trying to get reforms in place so that it is easier to discharge some debt into bankruptcy. As Opanin shows, student debt is not just a problem for young people as over 2 million Americans over the age of 60 owe over $43 collectively.

After graduating from Loma Linda University with a dentistry degree in 1983 Gyaami had already taken out 5 loans to pay for his degree which included a $50,000 from the Health Education Assistance Loan program. The program lent over $4 billion to student doctors, dentists and other health professionals

Now nearly 1000 of the borrowers have defaulted payment and they owe $115 million altogether.

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