OBJECTIVES: The Covid-19 pandemic has disrupted the healthcare system and created high burden of disease. This research aims to measure the healthcare costs of commercially insured and Medicare patients with Covid-19 before and after diagnosis.

METHODS: All patients with a Covid-19 diagnosis between March 2020 and January 2021 were identified in the IBM^® MarketScan^® Commercial and Medicare Research Databases, using International Classification of Diseases (ICD) diagnosis code U07.1. Demographic information was measured on the date of diagnosis. Healthcare costs were measured in the 6 months prior to diagnosis and compared to healthcare costs measured in the 6 months after diagnosis for pediatric and adult commercially insured and Medicare patients. The databases provide detailed cost, use, and outcomes data for healthcare services performed in both inpatient and outpatient settings.

RESULTS: In this descriptive analysis, 786,238 patients (743,987 Commercial and 42,251 Medicare) were diagnosed with Covid-19 during the study period. Overall, 46% were male, and 90% were above the age of 18, with a mean age of 40. In the 6 months before a Covid-19 diagnosis, mean (SD) healthcare costs were $4,771 ($19,795) for Commercial and $11,622 ($22,665) for Medicare. In the 6 months following Covid-19 diagnosis, mean (SD) healthcare costs were $7,795 ($35,633) for Commercial and $20,221 ($35,162) for Medicare. Post-diagnosis mean healthcare spending was 1.6 times that of pre-diagnosis for Commercial and 1.7 times larger for Medicare. A similar trend is observed among the subset of pediatric patients.

CONCLUSIONS: Measuring change in baseline healthcare costs in a highly representative claims database is foundational in understanding the true economic burden of the Covid-19 pandemic. Further research in longitudinal claims data will illuminate burden of long Covid-19. Further research is needed to investigate disparities and the burdens of out-of-pocket spending and absenteeism/job loss.