Sen. Bernie Sanders speak during the first night of the second 2020 Democratic presidential debate in Detroit, Mich., July 30, 2019. (Lucas Jackson/Reuters)

Megan McArdle (Washington Post) and Ryan Cooper (The Week) are arguing over medical bankruptcies. The debate over the number of such bankruptcies has been running for a few years, but this round of it started with Senator Bernie Sanders’s claim that there are 500,000 of them each year.

Cooper also argues that the debate is misguided.

Whether the actual number of people annually driven into bankruptcy by America’s wretched jalopy health care system is 530,000 or “only” 31,000, the number is way too big. If we implemented the Sanders plan — which would cover all medical, dental, vision, nursing, and prescription drugs, with only a small co-pay for pharmaceuticals — we could get rid of most of this suffering at a stroke.

My most recent experience with this kind of argument came a few months ago, when Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post disputed Planned Parenthood’s claim that before Roe v. Wade, thousands of women had died every year from illegal abortions. The actual number was probably closer to dozens than thousands. I commended Kessler’s article and added a couple of points. Several correspondents offered the same basic response: What difference does it make? Even one death of a woman from an illegal abortion is too many.

Whether it’s worth disputing a factual claim depends of course on how far off it is from the truth. It would not be worth running an article saying that Sanders is wrong because the actual number of medical bankruptcies is 460,000, not 500,000. Whether the number is closer to 500,000 or something one-fifteenth as large, on the other hand, is relevant to how much money should be devoted to reducing the number further, and how big a priority it ought to be for elected officials and voters.

And if the numbers don’t really matter, then why do Sanders and Planned Parenthood place such importance on phony ones?