Healthcare Costs and Unvaccinated Patients

[guest1168940]

Several articles from Forbes and others have reported the costs of healthcare of unvaccinated individuals is burdened almost entirely by private entities and the public in the billions.  A waiver (when your hospitalized most of the bill is covered) used by most insurers for hospitalizations is now being declined by some or will stop at the end of the year if unvaccinated. The urgent and long term costs such as ecmo (80k per week I believe it’s higher), post lung transplant, loss of wages if the family breadwinner will and have presented a financial and moral dilemma for Americans. The insurance companies and health care facilities will most likely never deny care but certainly this has come to light as we go into the third year of the pandemic. I am interested in others opinions about how society should or should not bear the brunt of free choice. Thank you.

[toomuchbaloney]

We are not on a sustainable trajectory.  Health costs associated with long covid will be devastating for the working class. 

https://www.usaspending.gov/

[JBMmom, MSN, NP]

I think we have villified non-immunized COVID patients as if they are the only patients that made a poor lifestyle choice leading to expensive medical care. I work in the ICU and rarely do we have a healthy patient that endures a random trauma or situation that brings them to us. 

We have noncompliant diabetics, we have CHF patients weighing 400+ pounds, we have alcoholics and drug abusers, we have patients that are not compliant with psychiatric medications, we have dialysis patients that skip treatments and end up with hypertensive emergencies,, patients with COPD that refuse to quit smoking, etc. These patients COULD all avoid hospitalization if they made better choices. 

I realize this is different because of the acute drain on resources given the number of people affected, but I don't think they are necessarily more responsible for their situation than many others. 

[macawake, MSN]

10 minutes ago, JBMmom said:

I think we have villainized non-immunized COVID patients as if they are the only patients that made a poor lifestyle choice leading to expensive medical care. I work in the ICU and rarely do we have a healthy patient that endures a random trauma or situation that brings them to us. 

We have noncompliant diabetics, we have CHF patients weighing 400+ pounds, we have alcoholics and drug abusers, we have patients that are not compliant with psychiatric medications, we have dialysis patients that skip treatments and end up with hypertensive emergencies,, patients with COPD that refuse to quit smoking, etc. These patients COULD all avoid hospitalization if they made better choices. 

I realize this is different because of the acute drain on resources given the number of people affected, but I don't think they are necessarily more responsible for their situation than many others. 

We see this differently. My opinion is that people have a right to abuse their own bodies. Some random stranger’s CHF or COPD doesn’t pose a health threat to me or anyone I love. Their infectious respiratory disease that they haven’t taken basic precautions to prevent, does. 

The other problem is that the unvaccinated use up a large part of a finite resource (hospital beds and staff) and create a situation where we simply might not be able to offer care to everyone who needs it. In a time of crisis all members of society need to pull together and do what they can to safeguard their shared resources. Society doesn’t consist of I, I and I. It’s we. In my opinion. 

[JBMmom, MSN, NP]

6 minutes ago, macawake said:

Some random stranger’s CHF or COPD doesn’t pose a health threat to me or anyone I love.

I completely agree with your opinion there. My take away message from the original post was a focus on healthcare costs, and to me the unvaccinated are not more of a cost burden than the other patients hospitalized with lifestyle choice related morbidities. 

But yes, they are a resource burden currently when hospitals are overwhelmed because of it and they are more of a public health threat than the others that I mentioned. I didn't mean to say that their choice was equal in the impact it has overall, only in the specific instance of cost. 

[SmilingBluEyes]

Ah but those with those other uncontrolled conditions (diabetes, smoking, uncontrolled hypertension) often pay more in insurance premiums. I say same should go for those willfully choosing not to vaccinate and becoming hospitalized. The middle class can't bear the cost of this forever; we are tired. Your body, your choice. Your consequences.

My mothers' asthma is not due to smoking or other poor lifestyle choices yet her insurance costs are sky high simply due to her pre-existing condition. PLUS she stands to get very ill or die if infected with COVID.

So yea, it really is our business and concern when people choose not to vaccinate. They should make it theirs, too. Let them pay for this burden or make the right choice.

OK KEVLAR is on.

[Guest219794]

13 hours ago, lMCRN said:

health care facilities will most likely never deny care

I think we are denying care right now.

Because we are overburdened as a result of covid, people are not getting the care they need.  Call bells go unanswered, elderly spend more time laying in their own excrement, pain takes longer to treat.  Surgeries are postponed.  The list goes on.

Whether that means we are "denying" care or just not providing it, the outcomes are the same.

[SmilingBluEyes]

We ARE denying care to many people who don't have COVID and yet can't get a bed for any number of other conditions needing hospitalization. Something has to give.

[guest1168940]

16 hours ago, JBMmom said:

I think we have villified non-immunized COVID patients as if they are the only patients that made a poor lifestyle choice leading to expensive medical care. 

But covid hospitalizations are preventable almost entirely with the vaccine and the virus is mutating going from pockets of unvaccinated hosts to others. 

[guest1168940]

15 hours ago, JBMmom said:

I completely agree with your opinion there. My take away message from the original post was a focus on healthcare costs.

Have to respectfully disagree, the difference between an opioid addict or smoker and those to chose not to take the vaccine is very wide we are in a pandemic and their choice affects others. 

[Guest219794]

In response to the OP-

The real question is whether this will effect behavior.  It will create bankruptcy for the patient, and lack of remuneration for the hospital.  Most Americans can't write a $400 check, let alone pay for ECMO.

But, insurance is based on risk factors.  If your behavior makes it obvious you are likely to crash your car, you pay more.  Crash it enough, you get dropped from insurance.  Crash it again, you go bankrupt.

 

[subee, MSN, CRNA]

But when moronic anti-vaxxers go bankrupt, we ALL have to pay for their bad choice.  Most other diseases that fill hospital beds don't have a simple, cheap and safe antidote to the problem.  At the very least, they should be paying higher premiums (and if their employer has to pay their premiums, pass it on to the moron).  But most of these people are simple and relatively poor and you can't get water from a stone.