CMS: National health spending grew 5.3% in 2014

U.S. spending on health care grew 5.3% in 2014 – largely due to coverage expansion associated with the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and rapidly rising prescription drug prices – following five straight years of historically low growth, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) reported Dec. 2 in an article published online in Health Affairs. While Medicaid spending increased by 11 percent (up from 5.9 percent in 2013), the cost per enrollee dropped by 2 percent. The gross domestic product share devoted to health care also rose to 17.5 percent, an increase of .2 percent from 2013. Read more here from the American Hospital Association. (Tim Pfarr)