• Skip to main content

DistilGovHealth

DistilNFO GovHealth Advisory

  • Publications
    • Home
    • DistilINFO HealthPlan
    • DistilINFO HospitalIT
    • DistilINFO IT
    • DistilINFO Retail
    • DistilINFO POPHealth
    • DistilINFO Ageing
    • DistilINFO Life Sciences
    • DistilINFO GovHealth
    • DistilINFO EHS
    • DistilINFO HealthIndia
    • Subscribe
    • Submit Article
    • Advertise
    • Newsletters

Incentivizing healthy foods could save Medicare and Medicaid more than $100B

Share:

April 3, 2019

Government payer programs are groaning under the weight of continually rising healthcare costs, but promoting healthy foods may be one potential solution.

According to CMS, Medicare spending growth is expected to average 7.4 percent between 2018 and 2027. The story is not much better for Medicaid, which is projecting 6 percent year-over-year spending growth between 2020 and 2027.

In response, CMS has increasingly looked at ways to influence health outside of the clinic. Some examples include the launch of the CMS Accountable Health Communities Model, which connects high-risk patients with care navigators, and the recent pitch by HHS Secretary Alex Azar for hospitals to cover housing costs with Medicaid dollars.

Another instance was the $25 million allocation in the 2018 Farm Bill to pilot financial and non-financial methods of improving healthier eating.

Want to publish your own articles on DistilINFO Publications?

Send us an email, we will get in touch with you.

New research published in PLOS Medicine has found that incentivizing a better diet by subsidizing healthy foods for Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries could have huge potential health effects, leading to cost savings in excess of $100 billion.

The study weighed two different policy initiatives: a 30 percent subsidy on fruits and vegetables – and a 30 percent subsidy on broader healthy foods which includes whole grains, seafood, nuts, plant oils, along with fruits and vegetables.

Based on the researchers’ simulation, the former program would prevent nearly 2 million cardiovascular disease events, save roughly $40 billion in healthcare costs and lead to an increase of 4.64 million quality-adjusted life years (QALY).

Widening the food subsidies past just food and vegetables has an even larger effect, preventing 3.28 million cardiovascular disease events, saving $100.2 billion in formal healthcare costs and helping patients gain 8.4 million QALYs.

According to the research, the subsidies would drive fruit and vegetable intake by more than 40 grams per day, equating to about 0.4 servings per day.

Lifetime policy costs for the subsidy programs would be $122.6 billion and $210.4 billion, respectively. Average estimated annual subsidy costs would be around $110 and $185 per person, depending on the program.

Based on these figures, the policies are cost effective, equating $18,184 per QALY for the fruit and vegetable program and $13,194 per QALY for the larger healthy food subsidy program. This compares favorably to the $50,000 per QALY willingness to pay threshold.

Using incentives to improve diet as a pathway to better overall health is an idea that has gained steam in recent years, driven by the direct connection between unhealthy eating and conditions like heart disease, stroke and Type 2 diabetes.

California approved a three-year $6 million program in 2017 to provide chronically ill patients with two delivered meals and snacks, as well as three counseling sessions with a registered dietitian over 12 weeks.

Hospitals have also started to experiment with prescription food programs that allow clinicians to prescribe healthy foods which patients can receive at a discount or a covered benefit.

“Medicare and Medicaid are the two largest healthcare programs in the U.S., together covering one in three Americans and accounting for 1 in every 4 dollars in the entire federal budget,” Dariush Mozaffarian, the dean of Tufts University Friedman School and one of the study’s lead authors, said in a statement.

“These new findings support the concept of Food is Medicine: That innovative programs to encourage and reimburse healthy eating can and should be integrated into the healthcare system.”

Date: April 03, 2019

Source: MedCityNews

Coffee with DistilINFO's Morning Updates...

Sign up for DistilINFO e-Newsletters.

Just a little bit more about you...
PROCEED
Choose Lists
BACK

Related Stories

  • Major Payers Find HHS Finalized Nondiscrimination Rule Too NarrowMajor Payers Find HHS Finalized Nondiscrimination Rule Too Narrow
  • New Clinically Validated Sleepcheck App LaunchesNew Clinically Validated Sleepcheck App Launches
  • Apple Still has a Lot of Room to Grow in the $3.5 Trillion Health Care SectorApple Still has a Lot of Room to Grow in the $3.5 Trillion Health Care Sector
  • Google Moves Further Into Healthcare: a Timeline of the Last YearGoogle Moves Further Into Healthcare: a Timeline of the Last Year
  • Superb Healthcare At Ultra-Low Prices? How Singapore Does ItSuperb Healthcare At Ultra-Low Prices? How Singapore Does It
  • AI, Machine Learning, and Blockchain are Key for Healthcare InnovationAI, Machine Learning, and Blockchain are Key for Healthcare Innovation

Trending This Week

Sorry. No data so far.

About Us

DistilINFO is media company that publishes Industry news, views and Interviews. We distil the information for you – saving time and keeping you up to date on your interest areas.

More About Us

Follow Us


Useful Links

  • Subscribe
  • Contact
  • Advertise
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Service
  • Feedback

All Publications

  • DistilINFO HealthPlan Advisory
  • DistilINFO HospitalIT Advisory
  • DistilINFO IT Advisory
  • DistilINFO Retail Advisory
  • DistilINFO POPHealth Advisory
  • DistilINFO Ageing Advisory
  • DistilINFO Life Sciences Advisory
  • DistilINFO GovHealth Advisory
  • DistilINFO EHS Advisory
  • DistilINFO HealthIndia Advisory

© DistilINFO Publications