MN's healthcare spending brakes sharply

Spending on doctors, drugs and other medical care in Minnesota grew a tiny 2 percent from 2010 to 2011, capping a three-year period that marked the slowest growth since the state started keeping track in the mid-1990s. The slowdown was so dramatic that it leaves the state in a position to pay back $50 million spent on money-saving health care reforms it created in 2008 — reforms that appear to have helped contain medical outlays. Minnesotans, along with their public and private insurers, spent $38.2 billion on health care in 2011 — well below the spending projection of $40.5 billion, according to an annual report released Thursday by the state Department of Health.