The Homa Files

Excerpted from WSJ,  “Uninsured to Spend $30 Billion”,
August 25, 2008

Americans who lack health insurance will spend about $30 billion out of pocket on medical care this year, but others — mainly the government — will end up covering another $56 billion in costs … The tab to cover all the uninsured would be $208.6 billion — $122.6 billion more than this year’s projected total.

Health-care spending accounted for 16.3% of gross domestic product in 2007, or about $2.2 trillion

The government pays 75%, or $42.9 billion, of the amount uninsured patients can’t pay — through Medicaid, the federal-state health-insurance for the poor and Medicare, the federal program for the elderly and disabled, as well as state and local taxes.

Complicating the measure: Some doctors and hospitals donate time and forgo profit to cover poor people

While many have argued that uncompensated care will translate into higher premiums to patients with private insurance … the study reported that the impact is “very small,” noting that despite an increase in the number of uninsured, hospital spending on uncompensated care has been relatively stable. That is partly because the public hospitals and clinics that most often care for the uninsured often don’t have many privately insured patients to absorb the costs.

* * * * *

Full article:   http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121963245880668193.html?mod=hps_us_whats_news

* * * * *

Want more from the Homa Files?
Click link =>  The Homa Files Blog

* * * * *

This entry was posted on August 25, 2008 at 6:57 am and is filed under Health Care / Medical Insurance, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.