Re: Rises in healthcare spending: where will it end?
Appleby suggests that the healthcare spending cannot rise forever and so it has to stop. (1) He reproduced a chart from the US Congressional Budget Office showing the US healthcare spending projection reaching 99% of GDP by 2082. (2) Is this startling statistic, a tongue in cheek reference to the predicting abilities of the US Congressional Budget Office? Or is it a dystopian prophecy of a healthcare hysteria in the US resulting in nearly all the goods and services produced in the country belonging to healthcare industry only?
We think such an over simplistic and unrealistic extrapolation of historical averages would be misleading particularly to the readers of a medical journal though it may cheer the bosses of healthcare industry.
Rapid Response:
Re: Rises in healthcare spending: where will it end?
Appleby suggests that the healthcare spending cannot rise forever and so it has to stop. (1) He reproduced a chart from the US Congressional Budget Office showing the US healthcare spending projection reaching 99% of GDP by 2082. (2) Is this startling statistic, a tongue in cheek reference to the predicting abilities of the US Congressional Budget Office? Or is it a dystopian prophecy of a healthcare hysteria in the US resulting in nearly all the goods and services produced in the country belonging to healthcare industry only?
We think such an over simplistic and unrealistic extrapolation of historical averages would be misleading particularly to the readers of a medical journal though it may cheer the bosses of healthcare industry.
Ref
1. Appleby. Rises in healthcare spending: where will it end? BMJ 2012;345:E7127
2. Congressional Budget Office. The long-term outlook for healthcare spending 2007. http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/87xx/doc8758/11-...
Competing interests: No competing interests