The Consumer Price Index rose 8.5 percent in the 12 months that ended in March, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Medicare care commodities and services indexes in the CPI rose 2.7 percent and 2.9 percent, respectively.
Healthcare inflation has generally held near its historical trend of 2 percent, Corey Rhyan, senior analyst for health economics and policy at Altarum, a nonprofit research and consulting group, told CNN.
Costs of gas and food can be adjusted quickly to national and global economic forces, unlike healthcare where payment rates are typically set in advance and last a year, CNN reported.
Medicare’s 2022 projections were finalized in the first half of 2021, before general inflation took off, according to CNN. Private insurers also negotiate rates in advance and sign contracts that typically set reimbursements in place for a year.
Though healthcare prices are not rising at accelerating rates for most people now, that could change if inflation remains high, Matthew Fiedler, a fellow at the USC-Brookings Schaeffer Initiative for Health Policy, told CNN. Fielder added, however, there are some peculiarities in how prices get set in the healthcare sector, which means rising inflation isn’t guaranteed.
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