For years, health researchers bemoaned what they saw as excessive medical care in the United States. Too many tests and treatments, they said, are unnecessary or even harmful, and add to the huge cost of health care in this country. The coronavirus has given them a unique chance to find out if they were right. “Maybe patients will do better.”The stakes are high, both for health and for the economy. Before the pandemic, an estimated 50 million American patients were subjected to one or more instances of health care overuse each year, at a cost of $106 billion, according to a recent analysis in the journal Health Affairs.

Source: New York Times December 12, 2020 07:30 UTC