COVID-19 hospitalization costs outpaced medical inflation

Editor's Note

The cost of COVID-19 hospital admissions increased at more than 5 times the rate of overall medical inflation as fewer patients died from the virus. The new study findings appeared in JAMA Network Open on January 3. The 26-percent increase in average costs to provide inpatient care occurred amid changing care practices, increasing vaccination rate, and evolution in the variants of concern.

The study focused on the admissions of 1,333,404 patients with a COVID diagnosis from 841 hospitals between March 2020 and March 2022. Researchers found the average cost of inpatient treatment rose from $10,394 at the end of March 2020 to $13,072 by March 2022. They attributed the rise in cost to improved COVID treatments and increased use of oxygen life support. Many of the early COVID cases were older adults with comorbidities, many of whom did not survive.

The findings highlight the increasing costs required to treat patients with COVID and the need for preventative measures, researchers say.