A Holiday Package for Hospitals: Year-End Legislation Addresses Healthcare

While millions of Americans have been stuffing wrapping paper and ribbons in the trash or heading to the store to return or exchange unwanted gifts, the federal government has delivered one more present to the American healthcare industry. This package comes in the form of the Consolidated Appropriations Act (CAA)—otherwise known as the COVID-19 relief bill—passed by Congress on December 21 and signed into law by President Trump on December 27. It is a nearly 5,600-page document that covers a wide range of topics and will take some time to fully digest; but, based on multiple societal publications and other sources we have reviewed, we have taken note of a few key highlights found in the CAA that we believe will be of interest to our readers. They are summarized in this message.