Funding Health Care: Options for Europe (European Observatory on Health Care Systems)

The question of how to generate sufficient revenue to pay for health care has become a serious concern for nearly all European policy-makers. This book examines the advantages and disadvantages of funding arrangements currently in use across Europe. Adopting a cross-national, cross-disciplinary perspective, it assesses the relative merits of the main methods of raising resources including taxation; social, voluntary and supplemental forms of insurance; and self-pay including co-payments. Chapters written by leading health policy analysts review recent evidence and experience in both eastern and western Europe. The volume is introduced by a summary chapter which integrates conceptual issues in funding with an overview of the main advantages and disadvantages of each method of funding drawn from the expert chapters. This is an important book for students of health policy, health economics, public policy and managment, and for health managers and policy makers. Funding health care: options for Europe......Page 2 Contents......Page 6 List of .gures, tables and boxes......Page 8 List of contributors......Page 11 Series editors’ introduction......Page 13 Foreword......Page 15 Acknowledgements......Page 16 chapter one Funding health care: an introduction......Page 18 chapter two Financing health care: taxation and the alternatives......Page 48 chapter three Social health insurance .nancing......Page 76 chapter four Health .nancing reforms in central and eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union......Page 97 chapter .ve Private health insurance and medical savings accounts: theory and experience......Page 126 chapter six Voluntary health insurance in the European Union......Page 145 chapter seven User charges for health care......Page 178 chapter eight Informal health payments in central and eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union: issues, trends and policy implications......Page 201 chapter nine Lessons on the sustainability of health care funding from low- and middle-income countries......Page 223 chapter ten Funding long-term care: the public and private options......Page 243 chapter eleven Strategic resource allocation and funding decisions......Page 267 chapter twelve Funding health care in Europe: weighing up the options......Page 289 Index......Page 318 The question of how to generate sufficient revenue to pay for health care has become a serious concern for nearly all European policy-makers. This book examines the advantages and disadvantages of funding arrangements currently in use across Europe. Adopting a cross-national, cross-disciplinary perspective, it assesses the relative merits of the main methods of raising resources including taxation; social, voluntary and supplemental forms of insurance; and self-pay including co-payments. Chapters written by leading health policy analysts review recent evidence and experience in both eastern and western Europe. The volume is introduced by a summary chapter which integrates conceptual issues in funding with an overview for the main advantages and disadvantages of each method of funding drawn from the expert chapters. [Ed.] N.B. p. 114 : Equity in financing and access The question of how to generate sufficient revenue to pay for health care has become a serious concern for nearly all European policy-makers. This book examines the advantages and disadvantages of funding arrangements currently in use across Europe. Adopting a cross-national, cross-disciplinary perspective, it assesses the relative merits of the main methods of raising resources taxation; social, voluntary and supplementary forms of insurance; and self-pay including co-payments. Chapters written by leading health policy analysts review recent evidence and experience in both eastern and western Europe. This volume is introduced by a summary chapter which integrates conceptual issues in funding with an overview of the main advantages and disadvantages of each method of funding drawn from the expert chapters. This book examines the advantages and disadvantages of health funding arrangements in use across Europe. It assesses the merits of the main methods of raising resources including taxation; social, voluntary and supplemental forms of insurance; and self-pay including co-payments Sustainable health care systems are built on reliable access to human, capital and consumable resources.