Former Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer, Quest Diagnostics
COVID-19 testing volume has 'come down,' Quest Diagnostics CEO says
COVID-19 #coronavirus #yahoofinance Quest Diagnostics CEO Steve Rusckowski joins Yahoo Finance Live to discuss the state ...
About Stephen Rusckowski
In a January 2023 interview, Rusckowski stated that Quest Diagnostics' COVID-19 testing volume had "come down" from its peak, though the company remained prepared for a potential increase. He described the prior decade as "remarkable," citing the Affordable Care Act, Medicare payment cuts, and the pandemic as major changes in healthcare delivery. Rusckowski noted that Quest Diagnostics represents "about two percent of health care costs in this country" but provides "about 75 percent of the information" used in clinical decision-making. He also said the company had "bent the cost curve" for its own employees, with 95 percent seeing no increase in healthcare payments. In a July 2021 interview, Rusckowski reported that Quest Diagnostics' COVID-19 testing revenue was "considerable" in 2020, exceeding $2 billion, and that testing volume had declined in the first half of 2021 before a slight increase linked to the delta variant. He stated that the majority of the company's positive COVID-19 tests at that time were delta variants, identified through next-generation sequencing provided to the CDC. Rusckowski also said the company was working to improve serology tests to distinguish between antibodies from vaccination and natural infection.
Transcript (16 segments)
A
Anjali0:05
Who is joined by a special guest, Anjali.
That's right, thank you so much. We are joined now by the CEO of Quest Diagnostics, Steve Rusckowski, really a legendary individual in the healthcare space over the last 10 years at the helm of one of the most important healthcare companies. Steve, thank you so much for joining us here today.
S
Stephen Rusckowski0:29
Thanks for having me.
A
Anjali0:32
I want to start off with obviously the pandemic, one of the most unprecedented situations that any CEO has had to contend with. You of course seeing that demand on testing like never before. Tell us about it and how you got through it.
S
Stephen Rusckowski0:49
Yeah, so it's been a busy two and a half years actually. It all started in the spring of 2020 when we first realized that this pandemic would be here and really sink its teeth into us. And so in March of 2020, we actually first started to bring up our testing, and then we brought it up not just doing one laboratory but throughout our whole system of laboratories. And we thought it would be capped within the year, but it extended itself into '21, and we continue to have substantial testing this year as well. So fortunately for us, we've responded to what we needed to do from a testing perspective, and we're continuing to advance the science to provide serology testing and other ways for us to start to understand where people are in their protection for COVID going forward.
A
Anjali1:47
Yeah, I want to talk about that continuation. Do you feel like the company is at a place now where you can really continue to scale up and scale down as needed, considering the fact that we might be facing future pandemics?
S
Stephen Rusckowski1:59
Yes, we have now about 300,000 test capacity per day. We've been at a fraction of that for the last several weeks. We actually have seen the testing volume for what's referred to as PCR, the actual lab testing capability for COVID, come down. But we're prepared in the event that it starts to ramp up, that we'll be able to bring on more tests. So we're not closing down that capacity, but we're prepared in the event that it comes back up.
A
Anjali2:30
And I was looking at the look back at the company, 10 years now at the helm. Talk to me about what the industry's been through. I mean, it's been really a push into consumer-driven healthcare decisions. We're talking about, you know, virtual care really on the horizon. So talk to me about how you've seen those changes and where you see a Quest role in all of that.
S
Stephen Rusckowski2:52
Yeah, it's been a remarkable decade if you think about it. We put in place the Affordable Care Act, we've had substantial cuts in how we get paid by Medicare in this industry, and then finally, as we just spoke, we just came through the pandemic. And so it's been three big changes within healthcare delivery. But through all that change, we've also seen emergence where when I joined 10 years ago, we said we're much more than a lab. What we do is empower better health. With that inside, we deliver every day for our physicians and increasingly for consumers. And we also believe that the consumer is now playing a much bigger role of their healthcare. And so we've brought up a capability a number of years ago to offer testing capability to consumers where they can go on and directly engage with Quest Diagnostics to get the test they need.
A
Anjali3:46
One of the other major milestones of the industry really went through was the Theranos saga. And do you, you know, everything that came after, the questions about testing, what do you think has been the biggest learning from that episode? And do you think that the industry's in a different place today?
S
Stephen Rusckowski4:05
Yeah, you think about what that dialogue brought to this industry. It was a dialogue around the importance of testing. The reality is we're about two percent of healthcare costs in this country, but we represent around 75 percent of the information that a clinician, a physician, a nurse, and an individual use to make that important next choice in healthcare. So a very important portion of that information that's needed every day. And then secondly, what that period of time showed us is that we can test consumers in a much simpler, more convenient way. And at Quest Diagnostics, we actually have brought up our patient service centers, and we have around 2,200 of those, and many of those are now in retail-like settings. And we've actually started to partner with retail partners like Walmart, where we have some of our patient service centers in their actual stores. And so the convenience of getting access to testing and the ability for you to directly order it has been a new capability. All that came out of that dialogue around the importance of testing and the need for it to be much more available to consumers.
A
Anjali5:16
Another big issue in the healthcare industry today still is cost. I know that you've seen the conversation over the past several years, and you know, right now the company is also doing something interesting when it comes to helping to balance out the cost of access to healthcare.
S
Stephen Rusckowski5:33
Yes, we have. Actually, a number of years ago, we said we need to do something about our healthcare costs for our employees. We self-insure about 60,000 people at Quest Diagnostics. So what we did is we put in place a different approach of managing our healthcare costs. We hired a physician with a healthcare insurance background, and we started step by step to see what we can do ourselves to bend the cost curve. And fortunately, I'm pleased to tell you that we did bend the cost curve. And actually, this year, what we just introduced in the fall, for 95 percent of our employees, there will be no increase in their payment for their healthcare. For five percent of those employees, there will be a fee increase, and that's primarily for the highest-paid people at Quest Diagnostics. So real good progress of bending the cost curve for our own employees.
A
Anjali6:28
And definitely a push into health equity. I've got it. And with, you know, just to look back and everything that you've achieved, and before Quest also working at Philips, you've really been in the healthcare industry for quite some time. What's next?
S
Stephen Rusckowski6:43
Well, you know, I've got a long bucket list for my personal life. I've got four great-grandchildren, two kids, and a lovely wife, and so we're going to spend more time personally. But professionally, I'll do something. I'm still thinking my way through that. I'm still actively managing Quest Diagnostics as a CEO. I'll stay as the executive chair till the end of March of '23, and then we'll go out to the next chapter of my life.
A
Anjali7:10
Sounds good. Well, we'll have to leave it there, and hopefully this isn't the last we see of you. Quest Diagnostics CEO Steve Rusckowski, thank you again for joining us today.