Tina was in the middle of battling multiple myeloma when the financial pressure started piling up. Treatment costs. Lost income. Bills stacking up faster than she could sort through them. Sitting with all of it, she said plainly, “It’s just been a struggle all the way. I’m sitting here trying to figure out how I’m going to survive.”
Her credit union paused her car payments for 12 months and dropped her interest rate to zero.
When she got the call with the news, she could barely find the words. “That’s wonderful. Thank
you so much. God bless y’all… you’re helping me out tremendously by doing this.”
That moment is exactly what Life Over Debt was built for.
The Financial Reality of Cancer
Most people know that cancer is physically devastating. Fewer people talk about what it does to
a family’s finances.
The numbers are sobering: cancer patients face average out-of-pocket spikes of $593 per month
in the six months following diagnosis, and for many, the annual burden can exceed $31,000.
In the first two years of treatment, more than 40% of patients drain their entire life savings.
Cancer patients are nearly 300% more likely to file for bankruptcy than the general population,
and when they do, their risk of dying early increases by 79%.
This is what researchers call “financial toxicity,” and for credit union members facing cancer, it
can be just as life-threatening as the disease itself.
What Credit Unions Are Doing About It
Life Over Debt is a growing alliance of credit unions working together to help members heal
from the financial trauma of cancer. The program gives credit unions a complete model for
responding when a member receives a cancer diagnosis, built around four core services:
- Pausing installment loan payments and interest for up to 18 months for members in
cancer-related financial distress. - Financial counseling from Certified Credit Union Financial Counselors to help the member
find their way through one of the hardest periods of their life. - Offering a Cancer Care Loan, a short-term loan with no payments and no interest for the
first six months, designed to help members cover immediate financial gaps. - Providing utility and transportation assistance to help patients keep the lights on and the
wheels turning so they can get back and forth to treatment, and recover in a warm and safe
home.
Advancing Medical Research
Life Over Debt credit unions are also working with medical researchers at the University of
Alabama-Birmingham to study the program’s effect on the financial, physical, and emotional
wellbeing of participating members. It marks the first time that the efforts of a financial
institution to ease financial toxicity have ever been studied. Credit unions are, quite literally,
creating an entirely new field of medical research through Life Over Debt.
International Recognition
In November 2025, Life Over Debt was named a Gold Winner in the 5th Annual Anthem
Awards, which recognizes individuals, companies, and organizations whose mission-driven work
is creating meaningful change around the world.
New Orleans Firemen’s FCU was named a Silver Winner for their implementation of Life Over
Debt through their Cancer Care Program.
Life Over Debt and NOFFCU were selected from over 2,000 submissions from 42 countries.
Why Credit Unions, Why Now
Credit unions have always existed to serve people in their hardest moments. The Umbrella Man,
one of the original symbols of the credit union movement, was designed in the late 1920s to
represent exactly that: everyday people, protected from the storms that threaten their financial
wellbeing, no matter what. Cancer is one of the worst storms a member will ever face.
Half of all Americans will receive a cancer diagnosis at some point in their lives. That means this
isn’t a niche program for a small segment of your membership. It is, sooner or later, relevant to
nearly every member you serve.
Ivonne, a member at Enbright Credit Union, put it simply after receiving help through the
program: “Thank you very much for this program. It’s an amazing blessing. It’s going to help a
lot of people to rebuild, to help them going through the illness and not to worry financially.”
Jackie Taqué, chief experience officer at Edwards Federal Credit Union, described why her
team joined the alliance this way: “To know that in the least likely place, your financial
institution, you’re going to find counseling and help and relief… to me, that is one of the biggest
gifts that we could give our members.”
Learn More
Andy Janning, founder of Life Over Debt, spoke at the 1934 Reception during the
Governmental Affairs Conference.
Explore the program, read member stories and find out how to get involved at
LifeOverDebt.com.
