This paper compares health care systems. It looks beyond normal academic, political, or journalistic rhetoric, by exactly sticking to facts, i.e. empirical data (in particular data provided by the WHO) and comprehensive case study analyses. The paper finds that a number of myths and common...

Healthcare tends to play a crucial role in every country and its society. Appropriate and well-performing healthcare systems constitute an important aspect of national policy. The most important issue connected with this matter is the appropriate adjustment of the health financing system. That...

Greece went into recession in 2009, after a decade of flourishing economic growth fluctuating annually around 4 percent; over the same period the average growth for the Eu-27 was just about 2 percent. The economic downturn had a series of adverse effects on the economy and the health sector....

This paper presents the analysis results of existing practices of out-of-pocket payments in the Russian post-Semashko health care system. It was carried out based on the data reflected in the ‘Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey' from 1991-2012 and data of the ‘Georating' survey carried...

“Health, as we all know, is by far the biggest part of the budget. And for years it has also been the fastest growing…. This government has reduced healthcare administration costs to below the national average, and has cut the rate of growth of health spending. That is no small feat….”...

“In 2007–2008, comparable health care expenditures stood at $425 Million. Since then, these costs have grown 7 per cent annually… [S]tatus quo growth of 7 percent per year in health care spending is simply not an option. The more we spend on health, the less we are able to address the...

“Between 1999-2000 and 2010-11, total government program spending increased by 36.4%, from $7,505 per capita to $10,240 on a constant dollar basis…. Nowhere is the need to bring expenditures and revenue into alignment more obvious and critical than in health care… with the population aging...

This paper investigates the impact of policies and institutions on health expenditures for a large panel of OECD countries for the period 2000-10. We use a set of 20 policy and institutional indicators developed by the OECD characterising the main supply-side, demand-side, and public management,...

This paper investigates the impact of policies and institutions on health expenditures for a large panel of OECD countries for the period 2000-10. We use a set of 20 policy and institutional indicators developed by the OECD characterising the main supply-side, demand-side, and public management,...

This work is a compilation of studies produced at the Social Studies Department - Disoc/Ipea to support the elaboration of the document "Brazil: the state of the Union - 2007". Health outcomes in the last decades, health policies after 1988 and the role of the government in health care are...