There were one million more people without health insurance in 2018 compared with a year earlier, and national healthcare spending hit a record $3.6 trillion last year, according to data released by the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) last week. That $3.6 trillion works out to more than $11,100 per person in the U.S.
About 10% of the population in the United States — 30.7 million people — had no health insurance last year, which marks the second straight year that the number of individuals without health insurance increased by at least one million people.
The $3.6 trillion increase represented a jump of 4.6% from 2017’s figure, which was 4.2% higher than 2016. But, the share of the economy that comes from healthcare spending dropped to 17.7% from 17.9% in 2017. The increase was attributed to the reinstatement of a tax on health insurance companies mandated by the Affordable Care Act which had been suspended for one year.
As a percentage of the nation’s total gross domestic product, the amount spent on healthcare last year was about double what was spent by other industrialized nations across the globe.
Spending at hospitals totaled $1.2 trillion in 2018, while spending at doctors and clinical offices accounted for $726 billion of the total. The amount spent on retail prescription drugs was $335 billion.
Higher health insurance deductibles and more individuals without health insurance led to households spending more than $1 trillion on healthcare, which represents the first time that household spending has topped that threshold. While the number of people with insurance dropped for the second straight year, the amount spent per person on individuals with health insurance increased by nearly 7% in 2018. It is the largest one-year increase in the past 15 years, according to a published report.
The cost of health care remains a top concern among voters heading into the 2020 presidential election, according to a published report
