The size of national health care expenditure is an important research and policy issue. This paper reviews theoretical and empirical analyses of an implied optimal size for a health sector. Various economic theories are explicitly or implicitly invoked, but none is fully satisfactory. Theory...

The objective of this study was to evaluate economically a screening programme within the Oxford Regional Health Authority for Down's syndrome, based on maternal serum {alpha} fetoprotein, unconjugated oestriol and human chorionic gonadotrophin as well as maternal age (the triple test) against...

This paper examines whether or not hospital competition in a market with fixed reimbursement prices can prompt improvements in clinical quality. In January 2006, the British Government introduced a major extension of their market-based reforms to the English National Health Service. From January...

This paper investigates how regulation impinges on the launch strategies of international pharmaceutical corporations for new molecules and generics across the main OECD markets during 1960-2008. Comprehensive IMS data is used to analyze the international diffusion of 845 molecules from 14...

This paper examines whether or not hospital competition in a market with fixed reimbursement prices can prompt improvements in clinical quality. In January 2006, the British Government introduced a major extension of their market-based reforms to the English National Health Service. From January...

Generic competition in the pharmaceutical market is an effective cost-containment mechanism that improves static efficiency and stimulates pharmaceutical innovation. There is no prior study that has empirically analysed the relative delays in adoption of generic competition. This paper aims to...

The aim of this paper is to estimate the return to the UK from health sector R&D drawing on the value of life methodology and the work by Murphy and Topel (2003). While acknowledging the caveats arising in making such calculations, not least the lack of consideration given to spillover effects...

A generally accepted view is that it is more efficient and ethical if global pharmaceutical prices vary according to countries? relative income. To understand manufacturers? pricing strategies, we compared average pharmaceutical prices in fourteen middle-income countries to those in three...