Cost to Treat COVID Increased by 26 Percent Over Two Years of Pandemic: Report

The cost of treating hospitalized COVID patients increased by almost $3,000 per patient over two years from the pandemic’s start, despite changes in care practices and increased vaccination rates. A new report in JAMA Network Open shows that costs increased by 26 percent between March 2020 and March 2022. At the beginning of the pandemic, treatment costs averaged $10,394, and by the end, hospital stays for COVID patients averaged $13,072. The research team looked at data from over 1.3 million inpatient COVID-19 patients from nearly 850 hospitals across the United States during the first two years of the pandemic. Patients were at least 18 years old, averaging 59.2 years. Over half were men (52 percent), and most were white (59 percent)....