America’s health problems and the resulting decline in life expectancy is not only a problem for citizens, but could also have a “devastating impact” on the economy, wrote infectious disease physician and epidemiologist Céline Gounder for the Los Angeles Times.
For every one-year increase in life expectancy, economic output could be boosted by 4%. Additionally, the country spends $4.5 trillion—17% of GDP—each year on health, with out-of-pocket costs skyrocketing, stretching people’s finances and sending more to bankruptcy.
At the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, legislators recognized the connection between public health and the economy, and they responded with federal relief programs and paid sick leave. However, “our abandonment of these efforts since getting COVID relatively under control sets our country up for mounting crises,” Grounder wrote. “We need to revive a historical source of support for public health measures: the business case for a health workforce.
These pandemic-era endeavors went away because of their price tags, but the cost of poor national health is much more expensive. The majority of the country’s health spending goes to treating people who are already sick, while just 4% supports initiatives to keep people healthy.
“Once again treating public health as an economic imperative could help broaden support for the type of interventions that became polarizing during the pandemic,” Grouder wrote, “but have a long track record of improving wellbeing and productivity.”
