For the first time, government programs next year will account for more than half of all U.S. healthcare spending, federal actuaries predict, as the weak economy sends more people into Medicaid and slows growth of private insurance. Government health programs are a growing burden on the federal budget, which is running annual deficits of more than $1 trillion. By 2020, according to the new projections, about one in five dollars spent in the U.S. will go to healthcare, a proportion far beyond any other industrialized nation, the Wall Street Journal reports.
