Health care costs grow more slowly for elderly than other groups
Health care spending for people under 65 is growing faster than forthose over that benchmark age, the government reported Tuesday. Whilethe growing number of older Americans has been expected to alterpatterns of health spending, the impact has been only modest and isexpected to remain that way, the Centers for Medicare and MedicaidServices said. Not surprisingly, per person spending is higher for older people than younger ones But it has not been growing as fast as costs for working-age people, CMS reported in a paper in the journal Health Affairs. Amongthe elderly, the largest decline in spending relative to younger peopleoccurred among those age 85 and older. Spending for this group was 6.9times higher than spending by the working-age population in 1987, butonly 5.7 times higher in 2004. For those 65 and over health costs were 3.5 times higher than working age people in 1987 and 3.3 times higher in 2004. Asmembers of the massive post-World War II baby boom turns 65 they willadd to the younger end of the elderly population, a group that isrelatively less costly for medical care than those 85 and over.
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