Many patients recover from COVID-19 within a few weeks, but some exhibit persistent or new symptoms more than four weeks after first being diagnosed. Patients with such post-COVID conditions are variously referred to as having long-haul COVID, long COVID or post-acute sequelae of COVID-19 (PASC). Using longitudinal data from a database of over 34 billion private healthcare claim records, FAIR Health studied a total of 1,959,982 COVID-19 patients for the prevalence of post-COVID conditions 30 days or more after their initial diagnosis with COVID-19. To FAIR Health’s knowledge, this is the largest population of COVID-19 patients so far studied for post-COVID conditions. The patients’ post-COVID conditions were analyzed, with the most common conditions identified. Particular attention was given to age and gender, mental health conditions and death. Among the key findings:

This is the fourth annual edition of FH® Healthcare Indicators and FH® Medical Price Index, two measures developed by FAIR Health to provide clarity in a rapidly changing healthcare environment. Drawing on the independent nonprofit’s national database of billions of privately insured healthcare claims—the largest in the country—these two measures apply different approaches to illuminate different aspects of the national healthcare sector, including, among other factors, trends in the place of service and billed and allowed amounts for professional services.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a profound impact on mental health, particularly on that of young people. Defining the pediatric population as individuals aged 0-22 years, and focusing on the age groups 13-18 years and 19-22 years, FAIR Health studied the effects of the pandemic on US pediatric mental health. To do so, FAIR Health analyzed data from its database of over 32 billion private healthcare claim records, tracking month-by-month changes from January to November 2020 compared to the same months in 2019. Aspects of pediatric mental health investigated include overall mental health, intentional self-harm, overdoses and substance use disorders, top mental health diagnoses, reasons for emergency room visits and state-by-state variations. Among the key findings:

Previous research has suggested that advanced age, male gender and certain comorbidities are risk factors for COVID-19 mortality. To shed further light on these risk factors in privately insured patients, FAIR Health, in collaboration with the West Health Institute and Marty Makary, MD, MPH, from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, undertook an analysis using the nation’s largest private healthcare claims database, the FAIR Health National Private Insurance Claims (FH NPIC®) repository. Evaluating all patients in FH NPIC’s longitudinal dataset, we identified 467,773 patients diagnosed with COVID-19 from April 1, 2020, through August 31, 2020. We examined relationships between the outcome of mortality (dependent variable) and the following independent variables: age, gender and preexisting comorbidities. The results of this analysis could help inform protocols for vaccine distribution as well as prevention and treatment protocols. Among the findings: