In May, 2018, a reader of Vox, the news and opinion website where I worked as a health care reporter, sent me a remarkable medical bill for his young daughter’s emergency department visit. He and his wife were trimming the 1-year-old’s nails and accidentally cut her finger, causing it to bleed profusely. The nervous, first-time parents wanted a doctor to examine the wound. They went to the emergency department, the only place that would see a pediatric patient over the weekend.