Introduction: Prophylactic vaccinations play a significant role in health care. As a relatively cost-effective preventive measure they can help to avert transmissible diseases and thus protect not only the vaccinated individuals themselves but also those who have not been vaccinated. In order to...

In the past three decades, farm families have relied on government payments and off-farm income to reduce income risk and increase total household income. Many studies have analyzed the role of government payments; however, little is known about the impact of health insurance coverage on labor...

Background: This contribution seeks to measure preferences for health insurance in Germany and the Netherlands, using two Discrete Choice Experiments (DCE). Since the Dutch DCE was carried out right after the 2006 health reform, which made citizens explicitly choose a health insurance contract,...

Background: In Switzerland, age is the predominant driver of solidarity transfers in risk adjustment (RA). Concerns have been voiced regarding growing imbalances in cost sharing between young and old insured due to demographic changes (larger fraction of elderly 65 years and rise in average...

Background: Prepayments and risk pooling through social health insurance has been advocated by international development organizations. Social health insurance is seen as a mechanism that helps mobilize resources for health, pool risk, and provide more access to health care services for the...

Background: The reliance on out-of-pocket payments for health services leads to a catastrophic burden for many households in Bangladesh. The World Health Organization suggests that risk-pooling mechanisms should be used for financing healthcare. Like many low-income countries (LIC), a large...

Community-Based Health Insurance (CBHI) is an emerging concept for providing financial protection against the cost of illness and improving access to quality health services for low-income rural households who are excluded from formal insurance. CBHI is currently being provided in some rural...

Background: The aim of this study was to identify costs in patients diagnosed with Celiac disease. Methods: This retrospective case control study covered the period 2003–2006 and was conducted in a large Israeli Health Maintenance Organization insuring over two million members. Our cohort...

Background: There is considerable interest in exploring the potential of social health insurance in Africa where a number of countries are currently experimenting with different approaches. Since these schemes have been introduced recently and are continuously evolving, it is important to...

This article examines a model of competition between two types of health insurer: Health Maintenance Organizations (HMOs) and nonintegrated insurers. HMOs vertically integrate health care providers and pay them at a competitive price, while nonintegrated health insurers work as indemnity plans...