Health spending hits $3.2 trillion in U.S.

Rate of increase is fastest since 2008 recession.

Total spending on health care in the United States increased last year at the fastest rate since the 2008 recession, reaching $3.2 trillion, or an average of nearly $10,000 a person, the Department of Health and Human Services reported Friday.

The growth coincided with continuing increases in the number of Americans with insurance coverage, through private health plans or Medicaid.

Federal spending on health care has increased by 21 percent over the past two years, as millions of Americans gained coverage through the Affordable Care Act, the department said in its annual report on health spending.

The increase in federal spending was driven mainly by the expansion of Medicaid eligibility and enrollment, according to the report, published online in the journal Health Affairs.

Under the Affordable Care Act, the federal government has been paying the full cost of Medicaid coverage for newly eligible beneficiaries. Thirty-one states have chosen to expand eligibility.

Overall, the government said, health spending accounted for 17.8 percent of the nation’s economy in 2015, up from 17.4 percent in 2014.

Total health spending rose 5.8 percent last year, and spending per person increased 5 percent. The Obama administration said the growth was “below the rates of most years prior to passage of the Affordable Care Act.”

Anne Martin, an economist who was the principal author of the report, said the federal government became the largest source of health spending last year, accounting for 29 percent of the total — more than households, private businesses or state and local governments. That stems not only from rising coverage through the health law but also an aging population, which is expanding Medicare.

The health law was always expected to fuel an increase in health spending, but the law has cost less than originally projected by the Congressional Budget Office, in part because the number of people signing up for subsidized coverage through online insurance exchanges was lower than expected.

Growth in total national health spending was exceptionally low for five years, from 2009 through 2013, in part because of lingering effects of the recession, officials said. The White House also asserted that the health law had slowed health spending by cutting the growth of Medicare payments to many health care providers and by encouraging them to become more efficient.

“Over the last 55 years, the largest increases in health spending’s share of the economy have typically occurred around periods of economic recession,” Martin said. Rapid increases in retail spending on prescription drugs also contributed to the growth of national health spending, officials said.