WASHINGTON — Healthcare will account for 1 in 5 dollars spent in the United States by 2015, and health savings accounts are unlikely to help much in containing costs, government analysts said Tuesday.
The U.S.' healthcare bill is expected to reach $4 trillion by that year, according to an annual forecast by the National Health Statistics Group at the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
At that point, health spending will consume 20% of the country's gross domestic product, up from 16% today, with the government paying about half of the tab, the researchers predicted.
Although the new Medicare drug benefit may help tame the growth of prescription costs, the government economists and actuaries who compiled the forecast said they weren't expecting much from health savings accounts, which the Bush administration has touted as a key means to control spending.
"The net impact on cost containment is likely to be far smaller than that seen from the massive shift toward managed care during the mid-1990s," they wrote in the online edition of the Journal of Health Affairs, which published the forecast.
The new Medicare drug benefit, on the other hand, appears to be curbing the escalation of prescription costs even though more people are getting needed medications. That is because the insurers offering Medicare drug coverage negotiated better-than-anticipated discounts with pharmaceutical manufacturers, the analysts said.
The forecast projects a 7.2% average annual increase in healthcare costs over the next decade -- well above the 5.1% growth rate predicted for the overall economy.
John Poisal, deputy director of the National Health Statistics Group, said the continued escalation in costs was fueled by consumer demand for an ever-increasing array of new medical techniques and capabilities.
"It's consumption and investment," Poisal said. "But primarily it's about consumption."
President Bush has promoted health savings accounts as an antidote to unchecked spending. The accounts allow families to save money tax-free to pay for health expenses that are not covered by special high-deductible insurance plans.
The accounts are part of a trend toward so-called consumer-driven healthcare. The idea is that consumers will spend less if they bear more of the expense.
