Brussels, 19/11/2012 (Agence Europe) - In 2010, health spending per person and as a percentage of GDP fell across the European Union, a new joint report by the European Commission and OECD - “Health at a Glance: EUROPE 2010” - states. The 27 member states of the EU were taken into account, as were the five candidate countries and three EFTA countries. In comparison with the average rate of growth of 4.6% between 2000 and 2009, health spending per person fell by 0.6% in 2010. This is the first time that a fall in health spending has been recorded in Europe since 1975. While the report does not show any worsening in health outcome due to the crisis, it underlines that efficient health spending is necessary to ensure the fundamental goal of more viable health systems in EU member states.
Health spending per person particularly decreased in Ireland (-7.9%) in 2010, although it showed an average rate of growth of 6.5% between 2000 and 2009. In Estonia, it fell by 7.3% in 2010 after growth of more than 7% between 2000 and 2009. These reductions concern both the public and private sectors. In Greece, estimates suggest that health spending per person fell 6.7% in 2010, while it had annual growth of 5.7% between 2000 and 2009. Another trend is that governments, under pressure to protect funding for acute care, are cutting other expenditures such as public health and prevention programmes. In 2010, this expenditure was 3.2% below that of the previous year. This means that on average, in the whole of the EU, only 3% of a shrinking health budget was allocated to prevention and public health programmes in areas such as immunisation, smoking, alcohol drinking, nutrition and physical activity. The report warns that spending on prevention now is doubtless much more cost effective than treating diseases in the future. The phenomenon of obesity is becoming more widespread in Europe, with more than half of adults in the EU today being overweight and 17% suffering from obesity. Obesity rates have doubled since 1990 in many European countries and now range from 8% (in Romania and Switzerland) to over 25% (in Hungary and the United Kingdom). Obesity and smoking are the main risk factors for heart disease and stroke, which accounted for over one third (36%) of all deaths across the EU in 2010, the report notes.
The conclusions of the report can be summarised as follows: (1) in 2010, health spending as a share of GDP was highest in the Netherlands (12%), followed by France and Germany (11.6%). The share of GDP allocated to health was 9% on average across the EU countries, compared to 9.2% in 2009; (2) the number of doctors per capita has increased in almost all EU member states over the past decade, from an average of 2.9 per 1,000 population in 2000 to 3.4 per 1,000 population in 2010; (3) today there are many more specialists than general practitioners (GPs) in nearly all countries, due to lack of interest in traditional family medicine and a growing remuneration gap. The slow growth or reduction in the number of GPs raises concerns about access to primary care for certain groups of the population. (IL/transl.fl)