Meggeneder O., Breucker G., Järvisalo J. (eds): Social insurance for health. The role of health promotion and prevention within social insurance in Europe, Mabuse

Abstract

The book under review, written completely in English, provides an overview of the current social security systems of five European countries: Austria, Finland, Germany, Poland and Sweden. The individual contributions have been written by specialists of the corresponding national social security institutions. Particular emphasis is placed on the role of health prevention, health promotion and rehabilitation measures, as well as on prospects for their future development. To begin with, the key terms of the book are defined in the introduction. The situation specific to each country is then described in a separate section that covers also the various aspects of the country’s social security system. There is no explicit comparison of the five countries. Only the concluding chapter compares a number of aspects of the social security systems and policies of the countries presented. For example, it discusses the paradigm shift observable in all European social security systems and questions the sole role of the state in providing and financing social security. Furthermore, it emphasizes the role of public-private institutions in defining measures to enhance health prevention, promotion and rehabilitation. The section on Germany provides a comprehensive and detailed overview of the different social security elements in light of the underlying laws in force: statutory health, accident, pension, long-term care and unemployment insurances. It highlights the role of health and accident insurance with regard to prevention, health promotion and rehabilitation. An outlook on the future challenges of health promotion and prevention concepts in Germany, starting with the political debate about the legal reorganization of prevention in 2004, concludes the section. Since the authors work for two of the main social security institutions in Germany, they dedicate two chapters to the specific work of these organizations (the Federation of Institutions for Statutory Accident Insurance and Prevention and the Federal Association of Company Health Insurance Funds). The comprehensive description of the many aspects of social security in Germany provides a detailed overview of all existing institutions and their specific work in the area of health promotion, prevention and rehabilitation. For those reading also German, it would be helpful for further studies to have the exact German names of the many organizations, in addition to their English translations, especially since the authors use mainly the German abbreviations. A complete list of all organizational abbreviations would therefore be of great help. Unfortunately, this shortcoming applies also to the sections covering the other countries. Finally, for native speakers of English the use of German hyphenation rules to break a word at the end of a line (e.g. u-nemployment p.7, promoti-on p.9 and structu-res p.11) may be confusing or even distracting from the content of this otherwise very informative book. J Public Health (2007) 15:143 DOI 10.1007/s10389-007-0090-8