Healthcare in Europe

58 countries with universal health care in 2009.[1]
Most European countries have universal health coverage.
 
  58 countries with legislation mandating UHC, and
>90% health insurance coverage, and
>90% skilled birth attendance.
European Health Insurance Card (French version pictured)

Healthcare in Europe is provided through a wide range of different systems run at the national level. The systems are primarily publicly funded through taxation (universal health care). Private funding for health care may represent personal contributions towards meeting the non-taxpayer refunded portion of health care or may reflect totally private (non-subsidized) health care either paid out of pocket or met by some form of personal or employer funded insurance. All EU and many other European countries offer their citizens a European Health Insurance Card which, on a reciprocal basis, provides insurance for emergency medical treatment insurance when visiting other participating European countries.

The European Union has no major administrative responsibility in the field of health care. The European Commission's Directorate-General for Health and Consumers however seeks to align national laws on the safety of food and other products, on consumers' rights and on the protection of people's health, to form new EU wide laws and thus strengthen its internal markets.

Healthcare Rankings

In 2000 the World Health Organization, WHO, published its rankings of 190 of the world's healthcare systems.[2] France was ranked in 1st place worldwide. The rankings for the European countries are shown in the table below. The lowest ranking European country is Russia at 130, while the lowest ranking (current) European Union country is Latvia at 105.

The World Health Organization's ranking of Europe's health systems.[2][3]
World Ranking European Ranking Country % Public funding*
1 1 France 76.9
2 2 Italy 57.1
3 3 San Marino 73.5
4 4 Andorra 86.7
5 5 Malta 58.9
7 6 Spain 90.6
9 7 Austria 67.3
11 8 Norway 82.0
12 9 Portugal 57.5
13 10 Monaco 62.5
14 11 Greece 65.8
15 12 Iceland 83.8
16 13 Luxembourg 91.4
17 14 Netherlands 70.7
18 15 United Kingdom 96.9
19 16 Ireland 77.3
20 17 Switzerland 69.3
21 18 Belgium 83.2
23 19 Sweden 78.0
24 20 Cyprus 38.8
25 21 Germany 77.5
31 22 Finland 73.7
34 23 Denmark 84.3
38 24 Slovenia 80.8
43 25 Croatia 79.7
48 26 Czech Republic 92.3
50 27 Poland 71.6
55 28 Albania 77.7
62 29 Slovakia 81.8
66 30 Hungary 84.9
70 31 Turkey 74.0
72 32 Belarus 82.6
73 33 Lithuania 75.7
77 34 Estonia 78.9
79 35 Ukraine 75.5
90 36 Bosnia-Herzegovina 92.6
99 37 Romania 60.3
101 38 Moldova 75.1
102 39 Bulgaria 81.9
104 40 Armenia 41.5
105 41 Latvia 61.0
106 42 FR Yugoslavia 64.8
109 43 Azerbaijan 79.3
114 44 Georgia 8.6
130 45 Russia 76.8

A different ranking of European healthcare systems, the Euro health consumer index, is being done by Health Consumer Powerhouse. The 2014 ranking included 37 countries measured by 48 indicators.

Euro Health Consumer Index 2014.[4]
Country Overall ranking Patient rights and
information ranking 		Accessibility
(waiting times for
treatment) ranking 		Outcomes
ranking 		Range and reach of
services provided 		Prevention Pharmaceuticals
 Netherlands 1 1 7 1 1 13 1
  Switzerland 2 12 1 3 14 6 9
 Norway 3 22 22 1 3 1 7
 Finland 4 6 10 6 4 6 1
 Denmark 5 2 4 9 6 13 9
 Belgium 6 22 1 9 4 19 9
 Iceland 7 4 14 3 9 1 21
 Luxemburg 8 17 7 6 6 5 16
 Germany 9 10 7 3 21 6 1
 Austria 10 9 4 16 11 19 9
 France 11 12 10 9 14 13 13
 Sweden 12 12 35 6 1 1 7
 Portugal 13 6 14 14 21 19 19
 England 14 8 30 16 6 6 1
 Czech Republic 15 22 10 16 11 26 13
 Scotland 16 17 25 16 9 13 1
 Macedonia 17 4 3 33 21 6 21
 Estonia 18 10 19 16 11 36 21
 Spain 19 24 30 14 14 1 16
 Slovenia 20 24 27 9 18 13 16
 Slovakia 21 15 10 25 24 19 13
 Italy 22 19 22 22 24 6 21
 Ireland 23 30 35 9 19 13 1
 Croatia 24 19 14 23 19 34 21
 Cyprus 25 30 19 16 30 26 19
 Hungary 26 24 14 30 24 19 21
 Latvia 27 15 19 26 28 26 28
 Malta 28 29 25 30 14 6 33
 Greece 29 36 22 23 31 19 21
 Bulgaria 30 34 14 26 35 26 28
 Albania 31 28 4 33 37 32 36
 Poland 32 24 30 33 24 26 28
 Lithuania 33 19 30 26 28 37 28
 Serbia 34 30 27 36 31 25 33
 Montenegro 35 35 27 26 35 32 36
 Romania 36 30 30 36 34 26 28
 Bosnia and Herzegovina 37 37 37 30 31 34 33

See also

References

[5]

  1. ↑ Stuckler, David; Feigl, Andrea B.; Basu, Sanjay; McKee, Martin (November 2010). "The political economy of universal health coverage. Background paper for the First Global Symposium on Health Systems Research, 16–19 November 2010, Montreaux, Switzerland" (PDF). Pacific Health Summit. Seattle: National Bureau of Asian Research. p. 16. Figure 2. Global Prevalence of Universal Health Care in 2009; 58 countries: Andorra, Antigua, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Brunei Darussalam, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cuba, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kuwait, Luxembourg, Moldova, Mongolia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Oman, Panama, Portugal, Romania, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Tunisia, UAE, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Venezuela.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 World Health Organisation, World Health Staff, (2000), Haden, Angela; Campanini, Barbara, eds., The world health report 2000 - Health systems: improving performance (PDF), Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organisation, ISBN 92-4-156198-X
  3. ↑ http://pages.stern.nyu.edu/~wgreene/Statistics/WHO-COMP-Study-30.pdf MEASURING OVERALL HEALTH SYSTEM PERFORMANCE FOR 191 COUNTRIES: World Health Organization
  4. ↑ "Euro Health Consumer Index 2014". Health Consumer Powerhouse. Retrieved 31 January 2015.
  5. ↑ http://www.who.int/whr/2010/en/index.html The world health report - Health systems financing: the path to universal coverage http://whqlibdoc.who.int/whr/2010/9789241564021_eng.pdf