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Health care's "COVID quarter" is here

A COVID-19 unit at a Houston hospital. Photo: Mark Felix/AFP via Getty Images

Health care companies will start reporting second-quarter financials in earnest this week, showing how the coronavirus lockdowns and subsequent reopenings affected their businesses.

The big picture: Revenues almost certainly will be down for most companies, as the virus forced people to stay at home and led to fewer people getting surgeries and going to pharmacies. But that doesn't mean profits were eliminated, and Wall Street has already pumped health care stock prices back to where they were pre-pandemic.

Between the lines: Health insurers stand to profit the most in the quarter because people deferred a lot of care that wasn't related to COVID-19.

  • Insurance companies still collected premiums, but paid out fewer medical claims — which inevitably will lead to higher earnings.
  • However, some insurers have issued premium rebates back to employers and consumers.

What to watch: Whether more companies continue to get large tax breaks that stemmed from federal coronavirus legislation.

  • Tax-exempt, not-for-profit hospitals also were battered in the first quarter by the market's downturn, so it's worth watching how much their sizable investment holdings rebounded.

Go deeper: Follow our health care earnings tracker

Go deeper

Alison Snyder, Eileen Drage O'Reilly
Oct 22, 2020 - Science

How the coronavirus pandemic could end

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

It's still the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, but history, biology and the knowledge gained from our first nine months with COVID-19 point to how the pandemic might end.

The big picture: Pandemics don't last forever. But when they end, it usually isn't because a virus disappears or is eliminated. Instead, they can settle into a population, becoming a constant background presence that occasionally flares up in local outbreaks.

Go deeper (3 min. read)Arrow
Axios
Updated Oct 22, 2020 - World

France becomes 2nd Western European country to top 1M coronavirus cases

French President Emmanuel Macron at the Seine Saint Denis prefecture headquarters in Paris, on Tuesday. Photo: Ludovic Marin/POOL/AFP via Getty Images

France has become the second country in Western Europe to surpass 1 million COVID-19 cases, Johns Hopkins University data shows

The big picture: France had reported 1,000,369 cases and 34,075 deaths from the coronavirus by Thursday morning, per JHU. French President Emmanuel Macron declared a state of health emergency and imposed a curfew on virus hot spots earlier this month. Spain on Wednesday became the first Western European nation to top 1 million cases.

Go deeper (<1 min. read)Arrow
Marisa Fernandez
Oct 22, 2020 - Health

FDA approves Gilead's remdesivir as a coronavirus treatment

A production line of Remdesivir. Photo: Fadel Dawood/picture alliance via Getty Images

Gilead Sciences on Thursday received approval from the Food and Drug Administration for remdesivir, an antiviral treatment that has shown modest results against treating COVID-19.

Why it matters: It's the first and only fully FDA-approved drug in the U.S. for treating the coronavirus.

Go deeper (1 min. read)Arrow