Spiraling Health Care Costs: What you should know

United States Citizens pay more than 1.5 trillion dollars for medical care every year and costs related to all manner of health care, such as prescription drugs, continue to accelerate. While a few of the reasons behind this booming bill are comprehensible, US Citizens caught in a cash crunch might be surprised to hear a few of the lesser-known causes of escalating health care costs.

The words health care may invoke images of doctors, nurses and hospitals, but the reality is that the medical field is a business and a remorseless one at that. Individual practitioners, researchers and participants may have tremendous aims and a true desire to aid people, but the structure of the US health care system assures profit is the number one issue of importance.

Here are some facts that might assist in explaining the soaring costs of American health care:

Pharmaceutic research and development corporations expend about twenty billion dollars each year on R&D, and roughly a similar amount on advertising and self-promotional marketing activities.

Also, drug companies have as many sales persons as there are doctors in the U.S.. One of the responsibilities of these sales teams is to convince doctors to attend pharmaceutical company-sponsored seminars where medicines are showcased.

According to some economic experts, the acquisition of up to date technology is responsible for more than 50 percent of new health care outlay over the last 3 years.

A great deal of the hard cash United States Citizens pay for health care finds its way into the spiraling profits on health care-related merchandise and services such as the supply of medical insurance. Even greater costs have been forecast for the future, particularly for prescription drugs.

For many North Americans who are unable to afford the health care they need, increasing costs typify an ever-increasing block to medical services and products. The fiscal burden is also experienced on the greater national scale with about 15 percent of gross domestic product going towards health care costs. That is equal to about one fourth of the annual federal budget.

Relatively, Canada invests in the area of 10 percent of its GDP on its public health care program. Unlike the USA, Canadas health care program is universally available to all citizens and permanent residents without cost. Other countries, such as Germany, in which there is a public/private delivery system model for health care, manage to serve their populations for even less while still having greater longevity than North Americans. This proves that the caliber of health care does not rise proportionately with the amount of money spent to attain it.

While many Canadians supplement their universal health care with extra insurance to the cost of medication and perks such as semi-private or private hospital rooms, health care insurance is much more of a necessity in the United States. Unfortunately, costs have been rising dramatically, making health care insurance out of reach for many Americans. Currently, more than forty million Americans do not receive any type of health care benefit.

For employers, offering health care insurance for employees is also becoming more expensive, with increases dramatically outpacing inflation rates. Some years, the difference is four or six fold. Even if premiums were to stay static, providing health care insurance to their workforce still costs several thousand dollars per worker. For smaller companies, or for the ones who employ a large number of people, these costs can be prohibitive.

Steps to trim down health care costs are always under consideration, though many are not popular choices. Suggestions that have been put forward by various sources have included:

Extra drug awareness and education. Millions could be saved if health care insurance covered only generic versions of drugs that have been found to be just as effective as their more expensive brand name counterparts.

Terminate expensive treatment options will only add a small amount of time to a patients life, particularly if it will not be quality time (i.e. patient is in a coma).

Encourage preventative care such as smart lifestyle alternatives, proper nutrition and exercise.

Examine ways to control drug advertising to consumers. There is supposition that advertising has led to prescriptions of non-necessary drugs.

Limit malpractice liability so doctors and medical professionals do not feel forced to cover themselves by ordering unnecessary diagnostics to substantiate conditions they already know to be present.