Unpacking the Conundrum of the High Cost of Healthcare
Throughout recent memory the United States Congress has pinned the high cost of healthcare on the pharmaceutical industry, citing sometimes exorbitant prices for disease-modifying therapies. But drug prices are only one aspect of a much larger issue.
To put the problem in perspective, before the pandemic, “Healthcare spending in the U.S. was 18% of the gross domestic product (GDP), the highest in the developed world,” Daniel Sem, Ph.D., professor of pharmaceutical sciences at Concordia University Wisconsin, told BioSpace. “That equated to $10,222 per person.” According to The World Bank, the country with the next highest healthcare spending per capita was Switzerland, at $9,666. Canada, Australia and Japan spend between $4,200 and $5,500 per person on healthcare. Their outcomes are comparable to those of the U.S. (These are all pre-pandemic spending levels.) In 2020, U.S. healthcare spending grew 9.7% to $4.1 trillion – $12,530 per person – and accounted for 19.7% of the GDP, according to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ National Health Expenditure Accounts.
