The total cost of typical employer-sponsored preferred provider organization (PPO) coverage for a family of four has increased 6.3 percent this year, to $24,671.
Analysts at Milliman have published that estimate in their latest medical cost index.
Climbing specialty drug spending helped increase the level of cost growth up from 5.4 percent in 2014.
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Both this year and last year, increases in employer health benefits costs have been below the 10-year average, but the increases in health benefits costs are still much higher than the overall rate of inflation, the analysts say.