No Country for Sick Men: The Political Determinants of Health Policy in Poland.

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to explain the political factors determining the relatively weak performance of the Polish health care (HC) sector. This can be treated as a critical case due to several reasons: first, the Poles as patients belong to the most unsatisfied ones in the European Union (EU), second, Poland spends on its HC-related expenditures one of the lowest shares of the GDP among the OECD countries, third, the number of doctors per 1000 inhabitants remains at the lowest European level, and the life expectancy in Poland is one of the lowest in the EU and is decreasing. The Authors argue that the policy inertia in the HC sector in Poland is determined by the group of inter-related political factors that effectively block the development of any positive trajectory in the Polish HC reforms. Of the various determinants analyzed the most significant appeared to be the post-communist legacy of the organization of the HC system, which combined with a short-term approach by politicians and weak decision-making processes in HC policy, makes any changes difficult to implement.