Makeup Artist Faces $50,000+ Medical Bill in Cancún After ATV Crash

29-Year-Old Los Angeles Makeup Artist Faces $50,000+ Medical Bill in Cancún After ATV Crash — With No Travel Insurance and Hospital Demanding Payment Upfront before treating her.

Editors Note: This incident has motivated us to start researching Travel Insurance. We’ll report back with our findings next week!

A 29-year-old Los Angeles makeup artist suffered a devastating broken neck and back after falling 22 feet from a wooden bridge when the ATV she was riding flipped during a guided tour in Cancún, Mexico, while celebrating her birthday.

With no travel insurance, Bakhshizadeh was hit with an immediate emergency surgery bill exceeding $50,000 at a Mexican hospital that refused to begin treatment until payment was secured. The dire financial situation prompted friends and family to urgently launch a GoFundMe campaign to cover the massive medical costs and her eventual return home to the United States.

Bakhshizadeh was on a birthday trip when the guided ATV tour turned catastrophic. As she and her boyfriend crossed a wooden bridge, an ATV tire snagged on a wire attached to the bridge structure, causing the vehicle to flip. Her boyfriend narrowly avoided falling after getting caught in the wire, but Bakhshizadeh was thrown clear off the bridge.

"His tire got stuck to the wire of the bridge... and then we flipped, the car flipped. My boyfriend got stuck in the wire. But I fell down off the bridge," Bakhshizadeh said in a Zoom interview from her hospital bed.

Her phone, left behind on the bridge, captured the entire fall on video. After slamming into the jungle floor, she was unable to move and had to be carried out on a board. With no ambulance available, she was transported to the hospital in the back of a truck.

Once at the facility, doctors determined she needed emergency back surgery. However, due to the lack of travel insurance and no upfront payment, the Mexican hospital initially refused to proceed with treatment until funds were guaranteed. A GoFundMe campaign was quickly established by loved ones to cover the more than $50,000 in medical bills. She is expected to return to Los Angeles in about two weeks.

"I was awake the whole time. You know how you sleep sometimes, and you fall in your dream, and you wake up? It was like that. When I fell, like, it was the longest and the shortest fall of my life," she recalled.

Despite the severe injuries to her neck and back, Bakhshizadeh remains hopeful about recovery. "I'm very, very, very lucky to be able to walk again, hopefully soon, because... I was about to be paralyzed," she said.

From her hospital bed in Cancún, she shared a heartfelt message: "Appreciate your health. Hug your loved ones, and if you can walk, go take a walk. Take some air, enjoy life. It's shorter than what you think."

This article has motivated us to start researching Travel Insurance. We’ll report back with our findings next week!