Nearly Half Of Medicare Primary Care Visits Were Provided Using Telehealth During COVID-19 Emergency

About 43.5% of all Medicare Part B fee-for-service (FFS) primary care visits in April 2020, during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) public health emergency, took place via telehealth compared to less than 1% via telehealth in February 2020 before the pandemic started. The number of weekly primary care telehealth visits rose 350%, from 2,000 in February to 1.28 million in April. In May, in-person visits began to rise, and the share of telehealth visits began dropping. About 30% of primary care visits in May were provided via telehealth, representing about 700,000 per . . .