Skip to main content

Canadian hospitals spend $23,000 on typical COVID-19 patient, report finds

Share
TORONTO -

The average cost per hospitalization of a COVID-19 patient in Canada is estimated to be $23,000, according to new data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information.

That price tag goes for both ICU and non-ICU patients. By comparison, it is three times higher than the average cost of someone hospitalized for a heart attack, $8,000, and almost as costly as it is to hospitalize a kidney transplant patient, $27,000.

The nearly $1 billion spent on hospitalized COVID-19 patients excludes Quebec hospitalizations, according to the data.

The data shows that Canadians who were hospitalized with COVID-19 were on average in hospital for 15 days. The average hospital stay for a patient with pneumonia, by contrast, is seven days, the press release said.

“COVID-19 patients tend to be sicker and to have longer hospital stays. The data reinforces that the virus can cause a serious illness and not simply a bad flu. Almost 1 in 4 hospitalized COVID-19 patients are admitted to the ICU and 1 in 5 die in the facility,” Nathalie Robertson, manager of financial standards and information with the Canadian Institute for Health Information, said in a press release.

On average, the cost of an ICU-admitted COVID-19 patient was $55,000. For COVID-19 patients who weren’t admitted to ICU, the cost came in at $15,000. By comparison, an ICU-admitted pneumonia patient costs $22,000, a heart attack patient in ICU costs on average $8,400, and a patient with influenza costs on average $4,959.

The majority of hospital spending went towards compensation and supplies.

This infographic provided by the Canadian Institute for Health Information compares the cost of COVID-19 hospitalizations to other common hospitalizations.

CTVNews.ca Top Stories

BUDGET 2024

BUDGET 2024 Feds cutting 5,000 public service jobs, looking to turn underused buildings into housing

Five thousand public service jobs will be cut over the next four years, while underused federal office buildings, Canada Post properties and the National Defence Medical Centre in Ottawa could be turned into new housing units, as the federal government looks to find billions of dollars in savings and boost the country's housing portfolio.

Local Spotlight

Stay Connected