Increase in Health Care Costs
The major reasons for the increase in health care costs include:
The Rise of Chronic Conditions
Chronic illnesses such as diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and high blood pressure have been on the rise. According to a 2017 study by Dieleman et al. (2017), the cost of treating diabetes increased by $64.4 billion representing the largest expenditure from 1996 to 2015.
High Cost of Medication
Despite the rise of chronic conditions, the rising cost of pharmaceutical drugs has been cited as contributing to over 50% increase in healthcare costs. In the study by Dieleman et al. (2017), diabetes medication represented $44.4 billion out of the $64.4 billion increase in cost for treating the disease.
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Health Insurance Costs
Health care costs have also increased due to the rapidly growing health care premiums. The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL), the average premiums for family coverage increased by 5% in 2018 reaching an all-time high of $19,616 (NCSL, 2019).
Managing Health Care Costs
Reducing healthcare costs should be the responsibility of every individual and stakeholders involved. For example, people should consider taking care of their health. A healthy population prevents illnesses and an increase in chronic illness. Another approach can involve the elimination of unnecessary and harmful to save cost on drugs that would not have any meaningful medical benefits.
Public Health Services in the Community
Some of the public health services present in my community include obesity prevention programs and mental health interventions. Obesity prevention programs have been implemented in targeting children in the community to address the issue of childhood obesity. On the other hand, mental health interventions have focused on teaching young people about sex, relationships, and substance abuse. The goal has been to tackle the factors that are likely to lead to stress and depression which contributes to mental health problems. I believe the programs are well conceived and can help address health issues in children and young people. However, I think the outreach is still limited and more efforts are needed for the programs to have a significant impact in the community.
References
Dieleman, J. L., Squires, E., Bui, A. L., Campbell, M., Chapin, A., Hamavid, H., … Reynolds, A. (2017). Factors associated with increases in US health care spending, 1996-2013. JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association , 318 (17), 1668–1678.
Hurley, R. (2014). Can doctors reduce harmful medical overuse worldwide? BMJ: British Medical Journal , 349 , g4289.
National Conference of State Legislatures [NCSL]. (2019). Health Insurance: Premiums and Increases. Retrieved April 22, 2019, from http://www.ncsl.org/research/health/health-insurance-premiums.aspx
