Impact of the economic crisis on the Italian public healthcare expenditure

TL;DR

The paper presents an empirical model estimating the 2008 financial crisis's impact on Italian public healthcare expenditure, highlighting potential deficits and the need for NHS re-engineering for sustainability.

Contribution

It introduces a data-driven model to quantify the crisis's impact on Italian healthcare costs and discusses policy implications for NHS reform.

Findings

Estimated healthcare deficit of EUR 3-5 billion due to the crisis

Regions failing to meet financial constraints face NHS funding cuts

Potential for NHS re-engineering to ensure sustainability

Abstract

The global financial crisis, beginning in 2008, took an historic toll on national economies around the world. Following equity market crashes, unemployment rates rose significantly in many countries: Italy was among those. What will be the impact of such large shocks on Italian healthcare finances? An empirical model for estimating the impact of the crisis on Italian public healthcare expenditure is presented. Based on data from epidemiological studies related to past economic crisis, the financial impact is estimated to be comparable to the healthcare deficit of Italian Regions (EUR 3-5 bn). According to current agreements between the Italian State and its Regions, public funding of regional National Health Services (NHSs) is limited to the amount of regional deficit and is subject to previous assessment of strict adherence to constraint on regional healthcare balance-sheet. Those Regions that will fail to comply to balance-sheet constraints will suffer cuts on their public NHS financing with foreseeable bad consequences for the health of their regional population. The current crisis could be a good timing for a large-scale re-engineering of the Italian NHS, probably the only way for self-sustainability of the public system.