Health Care

Write a summary report (250 words) from any topic related to Financial Issues in Healthcare that affects our community. Please use any article, magazine, newspaper, blog, book, or internet source.

ANSWER

Increasing Healthcare Costs

High healthcare costs have been one of the financial issues that impact the community. The growth rate of healthcare spending has outpaced population growth, Gross domestic product, and inflation for the last few years. Healthcare spending has affected the economy in complex and diverse ways across economic sectors. Health systems and governments have faced catastrophic financial problems due to additional support needed for the patients.

Some of the factors that have led to high healthcare costs include expensive new treatments and diagnostic tests, increased cost of drugs, high administrative costs, malpractices costs, and an aging population. The rising cost of healthcare has reduced access to care and high consumer debt (Rushefsky, 2019). The increased healthcare costs have also prompted the government to raise taxes, borrow more and lower investments in vital sectors such as infrastructure and education, suppressing the growth and development of households and businesses. Increased borrowing by the government due to increased healthcare costs has led to more interest rates which increase the cost of capital and the low ability of households and firms to obtain resources and invest in other essential activities. Rising costs raise pressure to reduce medical spending, which lowers physician reimbursement, increases beneficiary cost-sharing, and decreases eligibility for health insurance programs (Rushefsky, 2019).

People have avoided necessary medical care due to concerns about high healthcare costs. For instance, healthcare professionals have raised the concern that patients are missing care essential for their well-being, such as chronic disease management, thus increasing the mortality rate due to lack of care. However, avoiding care has resulted in delaying in treatable circumstances that are costly to treat.

In summation, the high healthcare costs have led to financial concerns in the society, increased taxes, high borrowing, reduced investments, suppressed economy, and reduced medical care. The growing burden of healthcare expenditures has increased over time to the local, state, and federal states and passed to the community and households, cutting down output.

References

Rushefsky, M. (2019). The Problem of Rising Healthcare Costs and Spending. In Healthcare Politics and Policy in America (pp. 283-358). Routledge.