Introduction:

In 2020, an exponential growth and accelerated expansion of COVID-19 was observed. Cuba had 20 hospitals ready for medical care, some 5,000 hospital beds and 477 intensive therapy beds.

Objective:

Describe the cost of the main assistance and logistics assurance services during the response to COVID-19.

Methods:

A descriptive and prospective study was carried out in 363 patients, between March 12 and May 30, 2020. The variables studied were patient-day, bed-day, medications, medical supplies, food, clothing, cost per salary and energy power consumed. To obtain the total cost of a patient-day, the fixed and variable costs were added, expressed in Cuban pesos CUP.

Results:

In the COVID-suspects patient ward, a high number of patient-day (14 578) and a low number of bed-day (5 976) were observed. The average cost per salary was higher in nursing (226,2 CUP). Medications generated at high cost (35,6 %). In April, the highest electricity consumption was recorded (36,6 %) and a cost of 18,071.1 CUP. In relation to the total number of patient-day, an increase in fixed costs (87,30 %) was observed over the variables.

Conclusions:

The analysis of the cost of patient day-during the COVID-19 pandemic allowed to detail, by hospitalization wards, how much the expenses vary between healthcare services and logistics assurance, as well as the differences between fixed and variable costs.

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