The COVID-19 pandemic posed severe challenges for governments, presenting unknown situations and requiring decisions to be made under unprecedented uncertainty. Scientists responded fast, developing vaccines to mitigate the effects of the disease and improve pandemic management. This study...

We assessed whether health spending of local government units in the Philippines is sufficient to deliver mandated primary health care (PHC) services under a devolved system, how PHC spending varies with fiscal capacity, and whether increased intergovernmental transfers following the...

This study reviews the literature on the impacts of Certificate-of-Need (CON) laws, which require the approval of states' health planning agencies for health care providers to engage in regulated actions such as opening or expanding facilities or purchasing equipment. Economic theory suggests...

The goal of universal health coverage (UHC) is for all people to receive the quality health services they need, when and where they need them, without incurring financial hardship. UHC covers the full continuum of essential health services, from health promotion to disease prevention, treatment,...

While the World Health Organization’s (WHO) role in global health is well-documented, there is a notable gap in research regarding its influence on domestic health policy in Lower-Middle Income Countries (LMICs). This paper, therefore, explores the WHO’s impact on advancing the Universal...

We examine the ezects of introducing prompted choice on organ donation behavior. Applying a generalized dizerence-in-dizerences design, we take advantage of the gradual roll-out of a policy in Italy that integrated the question of organ donation preference into the process of identity card...

This country report provides a description of the emergence of a health care system under public responsibility in Eritrea. The inception of the health care system refers to the first legislation stipulating entitlements to medical care. The report also includes a brief description of major...

This country report provides a description of the emergence of a health care system under public responsibility in Serbia. The inception of the health care system refers to the first legislation stipulating entitlements to medical care. The report also includes a brief description of major...

This paper elaborates a typology of regionalized abortion policy based on a comparative case study of Italy and the United States. Italy originally legalized abortion in 1978 and has seen little effort to modify the law since. Contrastingly, the United States' abortion landscape has been in near...

Seit fast einem Vierteljahrhundert steigen die GKV-Ausgaben pro Jahr um durchschnittlich 1 Prozentpunkt stärker als die beitragspflichtigen Einnahmen. Das gilt unabhängig davon, ob man die Aggregate betrachtet oder je Versicherten beziehungsweise je Mitglied rechnet. Setzt sich dieser Trend...

En México se necesitan urgentemente mejoras en los impuestos selectivos al tabaco, las bebidas alcohólicas y las bebidas azucaradas para reducir las muertes prematuras evitables. En México, 125,350 personas pierden la vida anualmente debido al uso de estos productos. Más allá de los efectos...

The COVID-19 pandemic has renewed the global focus on the role of public health spending, particularly in developing regions where fiscal space is mostly limited. Many African countries have started reassessing the health sector as a core economic resilience component. This study examines how...

The aim of the Public Health Emergency Preparedness Assessment, as mandated in Article 8 of the Regulation (EU) 2022/2371 on serious cross-border threats to health, is to improve prevention, preparedness and response planning in EU/EEA countries through the implementation of recommendations...

As a European citizen, you can benefit from the EHDS in various ways: you and your authorised healthcare provider have fast, secure and easy access to your health data from anywhere in the EU; your medical history including past and present illnesses, medications, and allergies, is available in...

Secondary use of health data under the EHDS benefits medical research in significant ways: researchers and academics have easier access to health data from across Europe; researchers and academics can see which health data is available and of what quality; health data is accessed via a central...

Seit fast einem Vierteljahrhundert steigen die GKV-Ausgaben pro Jahr um durchschnittlich 1 Prozentpunkt stärker als die beitragspflichtigen Einnahmen. Das gilt unabhängig davon, ob man die Aggregate betrachtet oder je Versicherten beziehungsweise je Mitglied rechnet. Setzt sich dieser Trend...

Geographic disparities in health outcomes persist across Indonesia, fueled in part by inequities in the physical access to and quality of health services. This note deploys a novel model to assess spatial patterns of accessibility of public primary care in Indonesia. It focuses on access to...

This guideline serves as a foundational tool to support evidence-informed policymaking. It offers a practical and structured approach for evaluating health policies across their lifecycle—from early planning and implementation to long-term impact assessment. By embedding evaluation within the...

In East Asia and Pacific (EAP), people are living longer but not necessarily healthier lives. As populations age and urbanize, an epidemic of chronic diseases including diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease is taking hold, affecting workers in their prime, eroding productivity, and...

Background: Hospital capacity planning can help to balance quality, cost-effectiveness, and accessibility of inpatient services. Achieving all three objectives equally is complex and requires a balanced and targeted approach. Moreover, the implementation of a national reform in this field in...

This paper uses high-frequency data on fine particulate matter air pollution (PM 2.5) to study the effects of high pollution on health outcomes in Mexico City. We combine hourly monitoring station data on air pollution and weather conditions with a rich dataset of 10 million health episodes...

This paper examines how a change in health policy uncertainty affects US industry returns using monthly data from January 1985 to September 2020. We employ in-sample and out-of-sample analyses, and we find evidence that 25 out of 49 considered industries are predictable during the health crisis...

Anxiety and depression were already prevalent in the EU before the COVID-19 pandemic, during which they increased before levelling off again. Suicide death rates have declined significantly over the past few decades, but they have moved upward again recently. Poor mental health seems to have...