Outlays for health care in the nation reached $212.2 billion in calender year 1979--12.5 percent higher than in 1978, according to preliminary figures compiled by the Health Care Financing Administration. This estimate represented $943 per person in the United States and was equal to 9.0 percent of the Gross National Product. This latest report in the annual series representing national health ...

BACKGROUND Healthcare financing should be equitable. Fairness in financial contribution and protection against financial risk is based on the notion that every household should pay a fair share. Health policy makers have long been concerned with protecting people from the possibility that ill health will lead to catastrophic financial payments and subsequent impoverishment. A number of studies ...

The central role that employers play in financing health care is a distinctive feature of the U.S. health care system, and the provision of health insurance through the workplace has important implications well beyond its role as a source of health care financing. In this paper, we consider the "goodness of fit" of employer-sponsored health insurance (ESI) in the current economic and health ins...

This article offers a theoretical framework for understanding the crisis of U.S. health care system and the mainstream debate on restructuring health care financing and delivery subsystems. The author argues that the crisis of the health care system is a cause and a consequence of the long cycle of structural changes in the U.S. economy since World War II. The article distinguishes between the ...

This Working Paper should not be reported as representing the views of the IMF. The views expressed in this Working Paper are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of the IMF or IMF policy. Working Papers describe research in progress by the author(s) and are published to elicit comments and to further debate. The study examines the effect of health care reform in Bulgar...

Psychiatric services in the former Soviet Union were characterized by high rates of institutionalization and a strong focus on biological treatment. In the post-Soviet states, these features remain—there is strong resistance to the introduction of modern, community-based, and user-oriented services [1]. In many cases, psychiatric reform programs have come to a halt or even been reversed [2]. It...

The spring and summer of 1999 once again saw the national political debate turn to issues about health care financing and administration. Political pundits noted that health care is a steady voter concern and that the mostly partisan debate had important political significance for next year's congressional campaigns. [FN1] Largely at issue were the rights and relations patients/consumers would ...

INTRODUCTION In Nigeria, inequity and poor accessibility to quality health care has been a persistent problem. This study aimed to determine knowledge and attitude of civil servants in Osun state towards the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS). METHODOLOGY This is a descriptive, cross sectional study of 380 civil servants in the employment of Osun state government, using multi stage sampl...

Economic migration and growth in informal employment in many of the major cities of developing countries, combined with health sector reforms that are increasingly relying on insurance and out-of-pocket payment, are raising concerns about equity and sustainability of economic and social development. In China, the number of internal migrants has dramatically grown since economic transition start...

International systems are frequently offered as models for health care reform. This study, focusing on preventive services for children and pregnant women in six industrialized countries, finds that a broad range of preventive services can be provided through health care systems with divergent financing and cost containment, utilizing multiple entry points into the health care system, and emplo...