27.6 billion health insurance surpluses

27.6 billion euros surpluses in the statutory health insurance

05/12/2013

Again, the statutory health insurance funds - despite the loss of practice fees - posted surpluses in the billions. From January to September 2013, all funds together achieved a surplus of 1.47 billion euros. This was announced by the Federal Ministry of Health. „The development shows that the system of statutory health insurance will continue to hit the black in 2013“, reports a ministry spokesman.

Surpluses of the health insurance companies at 27.6 billion
The health insurance companies in Germany are still accumulating billions in surpluses. According to the Ministry of Health, the total surplus until September 2013 was about 27.6 billion euros. Only 10.6 billion of these are invested in the health fund. About 17 billion euros remained with the coffers themselves. Above all, large funds such as the Techniker Krankenkassen or AOK were able to achieve good results.

However, the ministry noted that the health fund has experienced a seasonally common deficit of over € 2.46 billion in the past three quarters. Because the federal subsidy was lowered in 2013 due to the surpluses, the deficit is slightly higher than usual. Instead of 14 billion, there are now only 11.5 billion euros. However, to compensate for the abolition of practice fees, the health insurances received an additional € 1.45 billion from the health fund. The deficit was in the opinion of the Federal Ministry of Health because of the „positive development in premium income“ in conjunction with the contributory one-time payments, such as Christmas money, are fully offset at the end of the year.

Expenditure trend rising
The development of expenditure showed a further increase. Here, health expenditures per insured increased by an estimated 4.8 percent. This is an increase of 0.2 percent year-on-year (compared to the first half of the year). „Volume and structural effects accelerated spending development significantly from the middle of 2013 onwards“, so the BMG. According to information from the German Pharmacists' Association, the increase in pharmaceutical spending in statutory health insurance between July and October 2013 was around six percent compared to the same period of the previous year. Here, however, according to the Federal Ministry of Health „Savings by discount agreements of the funds in the amount of about 2.07 billion euros are not taken into account“. However, there are no efforts on the part of politicians to lower the cash contributions. (Sb)