WHO Lack of health insurance makes poor

WHO World Health Report: Lack of health insurance is making people around the world poor.

11/22/2010

The World Health Organization points out that more and more people around the world are slipping into poverty due to a lack of health insurance. The self-payable treatment costs often drive the victims into a debt trap, from which they can not escape without help from outside.

Around 100 million people end up in poverty each year due to a lack of health insurance. Not only developing countries but also developed countries such as the US, Greece, Portugal, Poland and Hungary are affected. The figures are taken from the WHO World Health Report 2010, which is due to be officially presented today in Berlin and from the „World Online“ quoted above. Those who are not insured are therefore subject to a significantly higher risk of poverty, since many people are simply overwhelmed with the costs of treatment.

In countries without a functioning state-subsidized health insurance system „financial hardships“ In the case of illness, aisle and gait, as those affected have to pay for their own medical care. However, the on-going treatment costs are often difficult for a private person to deal with, so the WHO estimates that around 150 million people around the world suffer from inadequate health care every year „financial disasters“ suffer.

Therefore, WHO calls on poorer nations to increase their investment in health care. Margaret Chan, WHO Director-General, called on governments, „Improve health financing and strengthen health coverage“. For counter-financing, for example, taxes on alcohol and tobacco could serve, according to the WHO. On the one hand, this would secure funding for health care and, moreover, would have a deterrent effect on tobacco and alcohol consumption. To date, in 33 low-income and middle-income countries, direct payments for medical treatment account for more than 50 percent of total health expenditure, according to the World Health Report. However, according to WHO recommendations, these forms of payment should account for less than 15 to 20 percent of a country's total health expenditure.

Some industrialized countries, according to the WHO, still have significant deficits in their health care. WHO recommends increasing the efficiency of each healthcare system as the first approach to addressing the issues. For example, according to the WHO Director-General, almost $ 300 billion a year is wasted due to hospital inefficiency. In addition, the evaluation of around 300 studies in the context of the World Health Report 2010 showed that hospitals could afford 15 percent more on average with the same effort.

Therefore, according to the WHO, developed nations should, first and foremost, try to increase the efficiency of their health systems in order to better supply the population. The targeted use of certain incentives also plays a crucial role. If set properly, they can significantly increase the efficiency of the healthcare system. On the other hand, if the incentives in national health systems are set wrongly, they can cause undesirable developments that significantly affect efficiency, according to the statement in the World Health Report. As an example of false incentives, the WHO refers to the individual remuneration of certain medical services, which leads to oversupply with the appropriate treatments. The WHO refers to caesarean sections, which are usually remunerated individually and whose number has increased in 69 of 137 countries. With flat-rate allowances, for example for family doctors, the WHO believes that the focus of medical care could be shifted to prevention.

In addition, according to the WHO, the pharmaceutical sector still has significant savings potential in many countries. Around five percent of health spending in developed countries could be saved through proper use and improved quality control of medicines, said the WHO Director-General. In the opinion of the WHO, the approach of France, which with the help of its „Strategy of generic substitution“ saved almost $ 2 billion in health care in 2008. Over half of all medicines worldwide will „improperly prescribed, delivered or sold“, so the statement in the World Health Report. The patients were often insufficiently informed about the correct intake of the preparations. For example, in WHO's view, there are still good opportunities to increase efficiency and significant potential savings in most countries

However, WHO not only called on industrialized countries to increase the efficiency of their health systems, but also called for greater commitments to their commitments to developing countries in the future. If all donor countries were to fulfill their commitments without delay, according to the WHO, even the „MDGs“ which will, inter alia, improve health care in the world's poorest countries. More than three million lives could be saved by 2015, the WHO emphasized. In order to raise the necessary financial resources, WHO recommends that the funds be spent on new ones „innovative ways“, such as through a tax on foreign exchange transactions.

With the „Millennium Development goals“ Ten years ago, the ambitious targets were formulated to successfully tackle, at least in large part, the extreme poverty, hunger, mortality of millions of children and mothers, and the epidemics of AIDS and malaria by 2015. However, the World Health Report clarifies that this „MDGs“ In the area of ​​health care, they have not yet been approached. For example, around one billion people worldwide still have no access to medical care. „For many people there is simply no health care, others can not afford it“, emphasized David Evans, director of WHO. In Germany, it is legally required to have health insurance coverage. Nevertheless, many small businesses in particular are still not covered by health insurance.

As part of the presentation of the WHO report, Federal Minister of Health Philipp Rösler (FDP) said that the quality of health care „Indicator of social cohesion“ but it is „no patent solutions“ for a functioning health system. Each country was required here to find its own way and the federal government had succeeded in its health care reform to ensure a solid financing of health insurance with fair distributed burdens, stressed the Minister. The critics of health care reform, who have been keen on the Minister of Health in recent months, may see this a little differently. (Fp)

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