A new analysis from the Kaiser Family Foundation pegged the preventable cost of hospitalizing and treating unvaccinated COVID patients between June and August at an estimated $5.7 billion, CNN reports.
Using data from both the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Service as well as health care studies, the report's authors found that each of the 287,000 "preventable" COVID-19 hospitalizations in the last three months cost around $20,000. When multiplied together, the two numbers amount to the $5.7 billion figure.
The analysis deems "preventable" hospitalizations to be "hospitalizations of unvaccinated adults for COVID-19 treatment primarily, while accounting for any post-vaccination infections that would have been expected if this population had been vaccinated," per CNN. The authors believe $5.7 billion to likely be "a conservative estimate of costs."
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The study also "did not account for outpatient care costs, and some data indicates inpatient health care costs for Covid-19 treatment may be higher than the $20,000 figure used," per CNN.
Overall, the monetary cost of COVID treatment for the unvaccinated is important to note, the authors write, because it is "borne not only by patients but also by society more broadly, including taxpayer-funded public programs and private insurance premiums paid by workers, businesses, and individual purchasers." Read more at CNN and the Kaiser Family Foundation.
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