Commentary

Health Care Spending–a 50% waste?

That’s what a new study claims:

About 50 percent of health care spending is eaten up by waste, excessive prices and fraud, according to a report set for release today by Boston University researchers.

One key area is administrative waste:

The report’s criticisms of administrative expenses are based on a study last year by Harvard Medical School that determined that bureaucratic inefficiency on the part of insurance companies, doctors, hospitals, nursing homes and other institutions cost the country $399.4 billion in 2003.