Covid economics - who’s winning?

[Med Director New England]

The longer this goes on the more you hear about the struggles of hospitals, medical groups, individual doctors - I wonder are insurance providers making out like bandits.

hospitals, hospital groups - all seem to be massively losing. No elective things happening, no preventative / primary care happening.

Doctors - media has story after story of doctor furloughs, paycuts and even layoffs. Even story of frontline doctors actually treating the hospitalized Covid patients taking pay cuts.

Insurance companies - still collecting premiums but seems like less is being paid out b/c almost no medical care is happening except Covid related illness and acute conditions that can not wait . I know a subset of folks have become uninsured with spike in unemployment but does this drop in premium collection offset the massive drop in health care expenditures by the remaining insured pool??

seems like the govt should be looking a this and forcing concessions by insurance companies if they are seeing increased profits. Maybe I am missing something; thoughts ?

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[D1b()4]

Funeral homes must be winning.

 

[yaah]

I have no idea what the pay scale is like for a typical COVID admission - particularly since the most severe ones are very long term admissions (2 weeks or more even). I would expect that even for a COVID admission the reimbursement is less than what the hospital has to spend on it, particularly given the extra PPE needed and the fact that the hospital is so limited in terms of anything else going on. I can't imagine insurance companies are suffering that much - they probably have graphs and charts showing how much they would be hit in a catastrophic situation but with the exception of a handful of places it may not get to that point patient wise. But meanwhile almost every hospital is treating it like a catastrophic situation even if they are not overwhelmed.

 

[Thr0mbus]

Insurance companies are doing well right now. Hospitals are losing their asses.

However, when people are out of their jobs then insurance companies will lose much of their business.

Everyone loses!

In the end the health care sector and industrial cleaning/industrial health sectors will increase market share. Consumer discretionary will lose market share.

The pie will be lessened overall especially as adjusted for inflation.

Prepare for a lower standard of living.

The longer the economy is shut down, the longer the recovery and the lower our standard of living becomes.

Do we want to save lives? Yes. But if we shut things down until there are riots in the street and people cannot access food and healthcare, the cure could be worse than the virus!!

 

[WEBB PINKERTON]

Grocery stores are winning. Amazon is winning.

Probably going to be the death knell for many struggling brick and mortar stores. If you like Macys, hit is fast when this quarantine is over.

I hate that so many offices aren't seeing patients right now. How many are being harmed by this? I'd hate to get glaucoma right now. Good luck finding someone to treat you. Just go ahead and go blind I guess.

 

[KeratinPearls]

Insurance companies are doing well right now. Hospitals are losing their asses.

However, when people are out of their jobs then insurance companies will lose much of their business.

Everyone loses!

In the end the health care sector and industrial cleaning/industrial health sectors will increase market share. Consumer discretionary will lose market share.

The pie will be lessened overall especially as adjusted for inflation.

Prepare for a lower standard of living.

The longer the economy is shut down, the longer the recovery and the lower our standard of living becomes.

Do we want to save lives? Yes. But if we shut things down until there are riots in the street and people cannot access food and healthcare, the cure could be worse than the virus!!

'We just can’t feed this many': 10,000 seek S.A. Food Bank help as COVID-19 ravages economy

 

[Med Director New England]

I really only mean the health care economy.

Certainly hospitals, med groups, hospital systems are crying poor. I think we can be certain they are financially becoming ruined b/c Except for hospital census every other metric is way down.

Covid is only sickening less than 1% of the ensured pool. The rest of the insured pool chillin at home, for the most part still paying premiums and not using up nearly as many health care currency as is typical. The patients with horrible, long hospital courses are disproportionate Medicare too - so your BC/BS, etc are somewhat spared in this regard too.

I suspect insurers are paying fairly for Covid hospitalizations. So far anything Covid the payers have been very agreeable, no patient obligation at all for testing, fairly reasonable for negotiating preferred client pricing for testing, no patient co-pay for Covid related admissions. I wonder if they are just making out so much overall from the medical shut down that Covid concessions are a drop out of the bucket of otherwise huge profits

Hopefully someone truly knowledgeable about this will chime, there must be someone in here with a spouse or similar in the know...

 

[WEBB PINKERTON]

Another great reason to become a rural pathologist. You can grow your own food and have plenty of farm animals. You will NEVER go hungry.

Go rural my friends.

 

[deleted314957]

Another great reason to become a rural pathologist. You can grow your own food and have plenty of farm animals. You will NEVER go hungry.

Go rural my friends.

I prefer Publix, my friend.


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[AZpath]

Another great reason to become a rural pathologist. You can grow your own food and have plenty of farm animals. You will NEVER go hungry.

Go rural my friends.

I have not been paid in toilet paper yet.
The only paper currency that is worth anything.

 

[Dave CX]

Another great reason to become a rural pathologist. You can grow your own food and have plenty of farm animals. You will NEVER go hungry.

Go rural my friends.

Where do you live? how many acres? Woods or desert or flat boring Midwest?

 

[KeratinPearls]

Where do you live? how many acres? Woods or desert or flat boring Midwest?

Hes in Kentucky-West Virginia area.

 

[Guest8]

Even if I was rural, how would I have time to be a full-time pathologist AND grow all my own produce and livestock? I'd have to hire out all the labor to farm my land so I could spend my 40-50 hrs a week at the office. So if that was the case I'd rather just continue paying others to farm by buying my produce and food at the grocery store. As it is I can have groceries delivered right to my building, or literally any type of cuisine imaginable delivered without leaving the house.

 

[yaah]

I hate that so many offices aren't seeing patients right now. How many are being harmed by this? I'd hate to get glaucoma right now. Good luck finding someone to treat you. Just go ahead and go blind I guess.

This is very sad. We have been discussing this at work, about how all these patients are going undiagnosed and untreated. There are visits available (but mostly virtual) for emergencies, and can still get imaging or procedures, but it's harder.

Interesting pro publica investigation today on the utterly predictable response by the private equity owned physician groups out there. Medical Staffing Companies Owned by Rich Investors Cut Doctor Pay and…

 

[WEBB PINKERTON]

This is very sad. We have been discussing this at work, about how all these patients are going undiagnosed and untreated. There are visits available (but mostly virtual) for emergencies, and can still get imaging or procedures, but it's harder.

Interesting pro publica investigation today on the utterly predictable response by the private equity owned physician groups out there. Medical Staffing Companies Owned by Rich Investors Cut Doctor Pay and…

My poor old mother is having blurry vision at the moment. I haven't been able to find anyone to look at her. The doctor who did her glaucoma surgery years ago wont see her. He said "is she seeing black holes?" I said no and he said well it can wait then.

 

[WEBB PINKERTON]

I prefer Publix, my friend.


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I love publix. I have a home in Sarasota and frequent that establishment when I am there. I wish Kentucky had grocery stores of that quality.

 

[LADoc00]

Insurance companies are still pulling in millions of dollars a day in premiums from those who still have jobs and basically paying out NOTHING, so its not hard to guess what the current winner and loser tally looks like.

But this will likely be the end of that entire economic model as healthcare organizations rush to the prepayment model aka Kaiser model (also killing it right now) and far far away from fee for service.

 

[Dave CX]

I love publix. I have a home in Sarasota and frequent that establishment when I am there. I wish Kentucky had grocery stores of that quality.

There is a predatory pathology group in Sarasota. Maybe you have heard of them

 

[KeratinPearls]

There is a predatory pathology group in Sarasota. Maybe you have heard of them

lol I think there’s one main group there. They had a job opening I applied. Good thing I didn’t hear back I guess lol.

 

[Med Director New England]

https://www.unitedhealthgroup.com/content/dam/UHG/PDF/investors/2020/UNH-Q1-2020-Release.pdf

Link to UNH earning report. To summarize
beat on top and bottom
Maintain yearly guidance
Cash increased/ debt decreased
will not need govt assistance
No furloughs, patient facing employees receiving hazard pay.

this is in spite of:
Any employee with Covid full pay while recovering w/o having to use ST or LT disability
No patient cost or obligation for Covid testing or treatment including hospital stay
No penalty or cancellation of policy for no payment of premium.

looks like insurors are winning in all of this

 

[Med Director New England]

Investor Information

Investor Relations information and materials, including UnitedHealth Group earnings releases.

www.unitedhealthgroup.com

Link to UNH earnings call which just ended and will be archived soon.
Pretty interesting, esp the Q&A session. Much of it relevant to what will be impacting pathology in the next 3-6 months.

 

[WEBB PINKERTON]

There is a predatory pathology group in Sarasota. Maybe you have heard of them

I drive by a few path groups in the area. One in Sarasota and another in Venice. I know nothing about either one. Work is never on my mind down there.

Maybe you tell Chris Hansen and he can catch them with some shady business deal. "Have a seat over here please"