Health Status Determinants: Lifestyle, Environment, Health Care Resources and Efficiency

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Health Status Determinants: Lifestyle, Environment, Health Care Resources and Efficiency

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Isabelle Joumard
Christophe André
Chantal Nicq
Olivier Chatal

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Abstract

This paper aims to shed light on the contribution of health care and other determinants to the health status of the population and to provide evidence on whether or not health care resources are producing similar value for money across OECD countries. First, it discusses the pros and cons of various indicators of the health status, concluding that mortality and longevity indicators have some drawbacks but remain the best available proxies. Second, it suggests that changes in health care spending, lifestyle factors (smoking and alcohol consumption as well as diet), education, pollution and income have been important factors behind improvements in health status. Third, it derives estimates of countries’ relative performance in transforming health care resources into longevity from two different methods – panel data regressions and data envelopment analysis – which give remarkably consistent results. The empirical estimates suggest that potential efficiency gains might be large enough to raise life expectancy at birth by almost three years on average for OECD countries, while a 10% increase in total health spending would increase life expectancy by three to four months.

Déterminants de l’état de santé : style de vie, environnement socio-économique, ressources
Ce document examine la contribution des soins médicaux ainsi que d’autres facteurs à l’état de santé de la population et tente de déterminer si les dépenses dans le domaine de la santé produisent les mêmes résultats selon les pays de l’OCDE. En premier lieu, il s’interroge sur les avantages et les inconvénients des différents indicateurs de l’état de santé et en conclut que, malgré leurs défauts, les indicateurs de mortalité et de longévité demeurent les meilleures approximations disponibles. Il suggère ensuite que les évolutions des dépenses de santé, des modes de vie (consommation de tabac et d’alcool, régime alimentaire), du niveau d’éducation, de la pollution et des revenus ont été des facteurs importants de l’amélioration de l’état de santé. Enfin, il estime la capacité relative des différents pays à transformer les ressources médicales en accroissement de la longévité, en s’appuyant sur deux méthodes différentes (régressions sur données de panel et analyse d’enveloppement de données) qui donnent des résultats remarquablement similaires. Les estimations empiriques suggèrent que l’espérance de vie pourrait s’accroitre de presque trois ans en moyenne dans les pays de l’OCDE si les ressources médicales disponibles étaient utilisées plus efficacement, tandis qu’une augmentation des dépenses totales de santé de 10% se traduirait par trois à quatre mois d’espérance de vie supplémentaire.

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Paper provided by OECD, Economics Department in its series OECD Economics Department Working Papers with number 627.

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Date of creation: 04 Aug 2008
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Handle: RePEc:oec:ecoaaa:627-en

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
C23 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Models with Panel Data
H51 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Government Expenditures and Health
I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Production
O57 - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Comparative Studies of Countries

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

NEP-ALL-2008-08-14 (All new papers)
NEP-HAP-2008-08-14 (Economics of Happiness)
NEP-HEA-2008-08-14 (Health Economics)

Cited by:
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Bruno Eugène, 2008. "The efficiency frontier as a method for gauging the performance of public expenditure : a Belgian case study," Research series 200809-12, National Bank of Belgium. [Downloadable!]

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