Increase In Health Expenditure Research Articles

Determining the efficiency path to universal health coverage: cost-effectiveness thresholds for 174 countries based on growth in life expectancy and health expenditures

Assessment of the efficiency of interventions is paramount to achieving equitable health-care systems. One key barrier to the widespread use of economic evaluations in resource allocation decisions is the absence of a widely accepted method to define cost-effectiveness thresholds to judge whether an intervention is cost-effective in a particular jurisdiction. We aimed to develop a method to estimate cost-effectiveness thresholds on the basis of health expenditures per capita and life expectancy at birth and empirically derive these thresholds for 174 countries. We developed a conceptual framework to assess how the adoption and coverage of new interventions with a given incremental cost-effectiveness ratio will affect the rate of increase of health expenditures per capita and life expectancy at the population level. The cost-effectiveness threshold can be derived so that the effect of new interventions on the evolution of life expectancy and health expenditure per capita is set within predefined goals. To provide guidance on cost-effectiveness thresholds and secular trends for 174 countries, we projected country-level health expenditure per capita and life expectancy increases by income level based on World Bank data for the period 2010-19. Cost-effectiveness thresholds per quality-adjusted life-year (QALY) ranged between US$87 (Democratic Republic of the Congo) and $95 958 (USA) and were less than 0·5 gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in 96% of low-income countries, 76% of lower-middle-income countries, 31% of upper-middle-income countries, and 26% of high-income countries. Cost-effectiveness thresholds per QALY were less than 1 GDP per capita in 168 (97%) of the 174 countries. Cost-effectiveness thresholds per life-year ranged between $78 and $80 529 and between 0·12 and 1·24 GDP per capita, and were less than 1 GDP per capita in 171 (98%) countries. This approach, based on widely available data, can provide a useful reference for countries using economic evaluations to inform resource-allocation decisions and can enrich international efforts to estimate cost-effectiveness thresholds. Our results show lower thresholds than those currently in use in many countries. Institute for Clinical Effectiveness and Health Policy (IECS).

The impact of CO2 emission on health expenditure: lesson learned from ASEAN five countries

This study is motivated by the issue of the Green Economy regime. The Green Economy regime promotes economic development while maintaining good environmental stability without destroying nature. Increased CO2 emissions, especially in the 5 ASEAN countries, will impact the surrounding environment, leading to worsening health levels in the long term. This poor level of health resulting from CO2 emissions will increase spending on health. The study aims to empirically analyse and see how the condition of CO2 carbon emissions will affect the health expenditure sector. The analysis of this study is by analysing Time Series data sourced from several websites such as the World Bank and also data from the Ministry of Finance. The methodology uses multiple linear regression models, or the Ordinary Least Square (OLS) method, to see how the effect of CO2 carbon emissions on health expenditure. The methodology also uses Panel Data Regression consisting of the Common Effect Model, Fixed Effect Model, and Random Effect Model. The variables used are CO2 emission as an independent variable and current health expenditure per capita as the dependent variable. The results obtained from this study are that increasing CO2 carbon emissions lead to an increase in health expenditures, along with a decrease in the quality of the surrounding environment and will have an impact on public health so that the relationship between CO2 carbon emissions and health expenditures has a positive and significant relationship.

Government health expenditures and health outcome nexus: a study on OECD countries.

The consistent increase in health expenditures is an integral part of health policy. The aim of this study was to investigate the impact of health expenditures on health outcomes in the OECD countries. We used the system generalized method of moments (GMM) for thirty eight OECD countries using panel data from 1996 to 2020. The findings show that health expenditures have a negative impact on infant mortality while positive on life expectancy. The results further verify that the income measured as GDP, number of doctors, and air pollution has a negative effect on infant mortality, while these variables have a positive effect on life expectancy in the studied countries. The outcome of the study suggests that health expenditures need to be properly utilized and improvements can be made in the health policies to increase the investment in health technology. The government should also focus on measures like economic and environmental to have long-lasting health outcomes.

Trends in health care spending on kidney cancer in the United States, 1996-2016.

Paradigm shifts in kidney cancer management have led to higher health care spending. Here, total and per capita health care spending and primary drivers of change in health expenditures for kidney cancer in the United States between 1996 and 2016 are estimated. Public databases developed by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation for the Disease Expenditure Project were used. The prevalence of kidney cancer was estimated from the Global Burden of Disease Study. Changes in health care spending on kidney cancer were assessed by joinpoint regression and expressed as annual percent changes (APCs). In 2016, total health care spending on kidney cancer was $3.42 billion (95% CI, $2.91 billion to $3.89 billion) compared with $1.18 billion (95% CI, $1.07 billion to $1.31 billion) in 1996. Per capita spending had two inflection points in 2005 and 2008, close to the approval years of targeted therapies, which corresponded to APCs of +2.9% (95% CI,+2.3% to +3.6%; p<.001) per year, 1996-2005; +9.2% (95% CI,+3.4% to +15.2%; p=.004) per year, 2005-2008; and +3.1% (95% CI,+2.2% to +3.9%; p<.001) per year, 2008-2016. Inpatient care was the largest contributor to health expenditures, which accounted for $1.56 billion (95% CI, $1.19 billion to $1.95 billion) in 2016. Price and intensity of care was the primary driver of increased health expenditures, whereas service utilization was the primary driver of reduced health expenditures. Prevalence-adjusted health care spending on kidney cancer continues to rise in the United States, which is primarily attributable to inpatient care and driven by the price and intensity of care over time.

Government expenditure on health and economic growth in Botswana

This study examines the relationship between government expenditure on health and economic growth in Botswana. It seeks to test the existence of cointegration and specification of the deterministic components with special reference to the Pantula Principle. This helps to overcome the shortfall of the method by Johansen, which may lead to spurious results by omitting the presence of deterministic components in the analysis. The cointegration approach is used and tested using three methods by Engle and Granger (1987) or EG, a procedure suggested by Johansen (1988) and error correction model (ECM) approach proposed by Granger(1988) and short-run analysis is made using the pairwise granger causality tests. Findings show that the correct model specification for testing long-run relationships consists of one cointegrating vector with a constant which is the most restrictive hypothesis according to the Pantula principle. Using the Johansen approach, total health expenditure and recurring health expenditure have a cointegration relationship with growth while development health expenditure and growth are not cointegrated. The ECM and the approach by EG confirm a weak and/or no cointegration between the variables. Growth has no effect on government expenditure on health in the short run, but a cointegration relationship suggests that it may marginally contribute to an increase in health expenditure over the long term. The study clarifies the correct model to test for cointegration and specification for the deterministic component. It confirms the existence of a healthcare expenditure-led growth hypothesis. This requires Botswana to design a policy that targets specific parts of recurrent and development health expenditure to support human capital development and influence future growth.

A Step toward Sustainable Health: The Influence of Health Indicators, Paramedical Workers, and Health Expenditure on Economic Growth in Emerging Economies

Abstract Worldwide, nations spend much of their budget on health to develop human capital, labor productivity, and growth. In developed countries, life expectancy, natural birth, and numbers of health care centers are high, and the availability of doctors and the paramedical staff-to-patient ratio are also very high. Therefore, emerging economies are also trying to allocate more finance to their health sector. To achieve the objective, data were collected (1961 to 2019) and analyzed with the assistance of modern econometric techniques. The study finds that health indicators, paramedical staff, and public health expenditures are significantly playing their role in influencing economic growth. It is seen that a one percent increase in health expenditures, number of hospitals, health indicators, and paramedical persons, growth rate influenced by 0.006, 0.0053, 1.0521, and 0.0003%, respectively. Moreover, the diagnostic test shows that the model's parameters are credible, stable, and reliable in the current form. Furthermore, if the health expenses are employed in the health care facilities and the establishment of new health centers, it will positively contribute to the growth process. The study also suggests that hospital management should be in the hands of management personnel, not doctors because a doctor may be good at diagnosing but in management control, they have no capacity.

P677 Combination of vedolizumab and exclusive enteral nutrition in patients with moderate to severe Crohn’s Disease

Abstract Background Crohn’s disease (CD) is an incurable chronic inflammatory condition of the gut. It causes severe gastrointestinal and extraintestinal complications and is associated with high morbidity, poor quality of life and increased health expenditure. Although increasing randomized controlled tests (RCT) studies demonstrated the premise of efficacy of biologics including vedolizumab in adult patients with active CD, there’re still 60% of patients hard to achieve clinical and endoscopic remission in real-world studies. Here, we investigated the efficacy of combination strategy of vedolizumab and exclusive enteral nutrition (EEN) in moderate to severe active CD treatment. Methods Twenty-eight patients with moderately to severely active CD patients treated with vedolizumab in IBD medical center of Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University in Hubei Province were retrospectively enrolled in this cohort. All patients received EEN for 16 weeks with concomitant vedolizumab standard induction. The clinical response, clinical remission, and fecal calprotectin (FC) normalization was evaluated in short- (week 16) and moderate-term (week 32 and 48). Endoscopic response and mucosal healing were assessed at week 16 and 48 (Figure 1). Figure 1: Study design Results Following vedolizumab intravenous induction and 16-weeks EEN treatment, patients achieved 71.4% (20/28) of clinical remission, 73.1% (19/26) of endoscopic response and 71.4% (20/28) FC normalization at week 16. For moderate-term assessment at week 32, sustainable efficacy of current treatment induced 19/24 (79.2%) of clinical response, 15/24 (62.5%) of clinical remission and 16/24 (66.7%) of FC normalization. Clinical response (15/22, 68.2%) and mucosa healing (14/22, 63.6%) were also observed in over 60% of patients at week 48 since treatment induction (Figure 2,3). Figure 2. Clinical and biochemical endpoints Figure 3. Endoscopic endpoint Conclusion Combination of Vedolizumab and 16-weeks EEN increased clinical and endoscopic outcomes in short and moderate term for patients with moderate to severe Crohn’s Disease.

Assessment of the Impact of Some Socio - Economic Variables on Worldwide Average Life Expectancy: A Logit Approach

Life Expectancy is considered as a key indicator for measuring the total wellbeing of a country. In this paper, the impact of some socio-economic variables on life expectancy is investigated. These variables namely: access to electricity, GDP per capita, unemployment total labour force, unemployment of youth total, health expenditure per capita, and adjusted national income were common for all countries. The Binary Logistic Regression model was considered and the analysis was done using the Forward Stepwise (Likelihood Ratio) procedure. Using the data of life expectancy of 70 countries in year 2020, results revealed that access to electricity and health expenditure per capita positively impacted on life expectancy. Countries that had Access to Electricity were 1.113 times (Prob. = 0.53) more likely to attend the worldwide life expectancy. Countries with increased Health Expenditure per Capita were 1.004 times (Prob. = 0.50) more likely to experience increase in life expectancy. Health expenditure per capita was significant at ; which implies that appropriate health financing has significant positive impact on life expectancy irrespective of country.

The impacts of the refugee population, renewable energy consumption, carbon emissions, and economic growth on health expenditure in Turkey: new evidence from Fourier-based analyses.

Health expenditures are affected by different macroeconomic variables. This study aims to examine the impact of renewable energy consumption, carbon emissions, the refugee population, and economic growth on Turkey's health expenditures from 1975 to 2019. For this purpose, firstly, the stationarity orders of the variables were examined with the Fourier-based stationarity test. The long-run effects of the variables on health expenditures were also examined using the Fourier-based cointegration test. The results show that there is a long-run relationship between health expenditures and the explanatory variables. In addition, long-run coefficients were calculated, and it was concluded that carbon emissions and the refugee population increased health expenditures while renewable energy consumption decreased. The causality results indicate that there is unidirectional permanent causality from health expenditures to renewable energy consumption and economic growth and bidirectional permanent causality between carbon emissions and health expenditures. Overall, adopting environmentally and renewable energy-friendly policies and controlling the refugee population are essential policy tools in terms of health expenditures.

Catastrophic health expenditure, incidence, trend and socioeconomic risk factors in China: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

To evaluate the incidence and trend of catastrophic health expenditures (CHE) in China over the past 20 years and explore the socioeconomic factors affecting China's CHE rate. The systematic review was conducted according to the Cochrane Handbook and reported according to PRISMA. We searched English and Chinese literature databases, including PubMed, EMbase, Web of Science, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), Wan Fang, China Science and Technology Journal Database (CQVIP), and CBM (Sino Med), for empirical studies on the CHE rate in China and its associated socioeconomic factors from January 2000 to June 2020. Two reviewers conducted the study selection, data extraction, and quality appraisal. The secular trend of the CHE rate was examined, and factors associated with CHE were explored using subgroup analysis and meta-regression. A total of 118 eligible studies with 1,771,726 participants were included. From 2000 to 2020, the overall CHE rate was 25.2% (95% CI: 23.4%-26.9%) in China. The CHE rate continued to rise from 13.0% in 2000 to 32.2% in 2020 in the general population. The CHE rate was higher in urban areas than in rural areas, higher in the western than the northeast, eastern, and central region, in the elderly than non-elderly, in low-income groups than non-low-income groups, in people with cancer, chronic infectious disease, and cardio-cerebrovascular diseases (CCVD) than those with non-chronic disease group, and in people with NCMS than those with URBMI and UEBMI. Multiple meta-regression analyses found that low-income, cancer, CCVD, unspecified medical insurance type, definition 1 and definition 2 were correlated with the CHE rate, while other factors were all non-significantly correlated. In the past two decades, the CHE rate in China has been rising. The continuous rise of health expenditures may be an important reason for the increasing CHE rate. Age, income level, and health status affect the CHE rate. Therefore, it is necessary to find ways to meet the medical needs of residents and, at the same time, control the unreasonable rapid increase in health expenditures in China.

Public health expenditure and under-five mortality in low-income Sub-Saharan African countries

IntroductionIn the year 2019 whiles the total world under-five mortalities was estimated at about 5.2 million, Sub-Saharan Africa contributed about 55% of these global under-five mortalities. In other words, the region alone recorded about 2.8 million under-five deaths out of the global 5.2 million under-five mortalities in 2019. On the other hand, public health expenditure in Sub-Saharan Africa though very low as compared to other regions has also seen a steady increase over the years. This has resulted in an increased interest of researchers and policymakers in scrutinizing the effect of healthcare spending on health status in Sub-Saharan Africa. Thus, the purpose of this study is to investigate the association between public healthcare spending and the under-five mortality rate in low-income countries of Sub-Saharan Africa. This has become necessary due to the impact of healthcare spending on the quality and quantity of the health system and the long-run effect on health outcomes and its overall link to economic growth and development. MethodsA balanced panel of data from twenty low-income countries in Sub-Saharan Africa was sourced from the World Development Indicators dataset spanning the year 2000–2019. The under-5 mortality rate was used as the outcome variable whereas domestic health expenditure was used as the independent variable of interest. Total fertility rate, percentage population of females, the practice of open defecation, and immunization against diphtheria-pertussis-tetanus (DPT) were considered potential confounding variables. The static model was applied. To arrive at the appropriate model for the study, the robust Hausman test was employed to aid in the selection between the random effect estimator and the fixed effect estimator, and the results led to the selection of the fixed effect estimator. ResultsThe results showed that domestic health spending has a significantly negative relationship (Fixed Effects = −5.275; p < 0.05) with the under-five mortality rate in low-income countries of Sub-Saharan Africa. For every additional percentage increase in domestic health spending, it is likely to result in about 5.3 units fall in under-five mortality rate. Total fertility rate, female population, and rural people practicing open defecation were positively associated while immunization against DPTwas negatively associated (p < 0.01) with an under-5 mortality rate. ConclusionThe study revealed a strong relationship between domestic health spending and the under-five mortality rate. We conclude that a sustained increase in health expenditure and improvement in social conditions are required to reduce under-5 mortalities within low-income countries of Sub-Saharan Africa.

LULUCF ile Sağlık Harcamaları Arasındaki Dinamik Etkileşim: OECD Ülkelerinden Kanıtlar

One of the most important discoveries in human history is fossil fuels and their utilization. Energy sources such as oil, natural gas, and coal are defined as fossil fuels. The devastating destruction of fossil fuels, especially for human health and the environment, has become remarkable in recent years. Every year, thousands of people suffer from diseases related to air pollution, and their treatment is expensive and long-term. This situation leads to difficult and time-consuming health problems as well as increased health expenditures. In this study, it is emphasized that both cheap and natural methods should be used and made widespread in the fight against harmful gases. An example of this struggle is the "Land Use, Land Use Change, and Forestry" activities called LULUCF. Although previous studies have enriched our understanding of LULUCF, no study has directly examined the relationship between LULUCF and emissions and health expenditures. To overcome this shortcoming, this paper establishes a comprehensive analytical framework to systematically estimate the decoupling between the variables. Using an ARDL bounds testing model estimated for the period 1990–2022, this paper aims to examine the impact of emissions including LULUCF and emissions excluding LULUCF on health expenditure for OECD countries. The empirical evidence shows that emissions have a significant and positive impact on health expenditures in both cases. However, with the exception of LULUCF, the impact of emissions on health expenditures is larger. This result may be an alternative option for policymakers to combat health problems and spend on environmental impacts.

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN POVERTY AND PUBLIC HEALTH EXPENDITURES: A PANEL DATA ANALYSIS

Yoksulluk esas itibariyle bireylerin ihtiyaçlarını karşılayabilmesi için yeterli gelire sahip olmaması durumunu ifade etmektedir. Ülkeler açısından önemli olan bu sorunun çözümünün gerçekleşmesi için devletler, ülkelerde politikaları tasarlayan ve uygulamaya koyan kurum olarak son derece önemli bir unsurdur. Kamu sağlık harcamaları da devletin harcama kalemlerinden biri olarak karşımıza çıkmaktadır. Çalışmada 2006 ile 2019 yılları arasında seçilmiş 24 OECD ülkesi için yoksulluk riski ve kamu sağlık harcamalarına yönelik yıllık veriler ele alınarak panel veri analizi gerçekleştirilmiştir. Analizde yoksulluk riski bağımlı değişken, sağlık harcamaları bağımsız değişken olarak kullanılmıştır. Çalışmanın amacı, kamu sağlık harcamaları ve yoksulluk arasında bir ilişki olup olmadığının incelenmesidir. Çalışma, güncel veriler ve geniş bir örneklem ile kamu sağlık harcaması ile yoksulluk arasındaki ilişkiyi ilgili değişkenler kullanılarak analiz eden ilk çalışma olması yönlerinden literatüre katkı sağlamaktadır. Çalışmada eğim katsayılarının heterojenliği ve serilerde yatay kesit bağımlılığı tespit edildikten sonra serilerin durağanlık sınaması CIPS panel birim kök testi ile gerçekleştirilmiştir. Eşbütünleşme ilişkisi , yatay kesit bağımlılığını göz önünde bulunduran Westerlund Variance Ratio panel eşbütünleşme testi yardımıyla analiz edilmiştir. Uzun dönem eşbütünleşme katsayıları Mean Group Estimator yöntemiyle tahminlenmiştir. Yapılan analizlere göre, kamu sağlık harcamaları ve yoksulluk arasında uzun dönemli eşbütünleşme ilişkisi olduğu ve sağlık harcamalarındaki artışın yoksulluk riskini uzun dönemde azalttığı sonucuna ulaşılmıştır.

Evaluation of the factors that affect the efficiency of diagnostic imaging technologies in Turkey: A two-stage data envelopment analysis

Objective: The healthcare sector is observed to be both labor and technology concentrated. Particularly based on the technological developments, there is a major increase in health expenditures. Technological devices, which make pressure on health expenditures, affect the whole world while making technology management become a global concern and a long-term problem. This study aims to compare the efficiency of medical device use among 81 provinces in Turkey. The main objective of this study is to determine a national framework by reflecting the efficient and inefficient provinces in terms of medical device use and to make various recommendations accordingly. &#x0D; Materials and Methods: The study is comprised of a two-stage analysis. Firstly, the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and then the Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) were utilized respectively. The efficient and inefficient provinces regarding medical device use were identified through DEA while the factors affecting the efficiency of provinces through OLS. &#x0D; Results: 22 provinces were found as efficient and 59 as inefficient among 81 provinces in total. According to the regression model, there is not any statistically significant effect of the variables such as metropolitan, rate of university graduates, gross domestic product per capita on the efficiency score (p&gt;0.05); the number of physicians and old-age dependency rate has a statistically significant effect on the efficiency score (p≤0.05). &#x0D; Conclusion: This study is considered to provide guiding information to health policy makers and planners through its results.

The nexus between carbon emission, energy use, and health expenditure: empirical evidence from Bangladesh

Bangladesh is facing a conundrum in figuring out how to improve public health while simultaneously reducing the environmental pollution. To alleviate the pressure from the high healthcare expenditure in Bangladesh, environmental management efforts to improve the quality of the environment need to be developed with the help of understanding the nexus between carbon emission, energy use, and health expenditure. In a society that is experiencing quick and difficult environmental problems due to rising energy demand, the current study focused on evaluating the effects of carbon dioxide emissions, fossil fuel energy use, and renewable energy use on health expenditure in Bangladesh. Time series data were analyzed from the year 2000 to 2020 using the Dynamic Ordinary Least Squares technique. The findings revealed that a 1% increase in carbon dioxide emissions and fossil fuel energy use will increase health expenditure by 0.95% and 2.67%, respectively. Furthermore, a 1% increase in renewable energy use may result in reduced health expenditure by 1.44% in the long run. This article provides policy recommendations to ensure environmental sustainability and healthcare facilities by lowering carbon emission in Bangladesh. This research would be helpful for designing a proactive health scheme to counteract the emerging health consequences of environmental pollution in Bangladesh.Graphical

The Link between Government Health Expenditure and Health Outcome in Nigeria, 1981-2019

This study examines the relationship between government health expenditure and health outcome in Nigeria using time series data on infant mortality, government health expenditure, school enrollment ratio and the gross domestic product for the period covering 1981 to 2020. The study sourced data from the World Bank data base and Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) statistical bulletin. Infant mortality rate was used as a proxy for health outcome based on data availability and the literature. As dictated by the data, the study used Vector Autoregressive model (VAR) to analyse the relationship between government health expenditure and health outcome in Nigeria for the period under study. The variables in the model were all integrated of order one and were cointegrated using the Johansen’s cointegration test. Government health expenditure is found to have a negative relationship with infant mortality in Nigeria; an indication that an increase in health expenditure has the tendency to decrease infant mortality in Nigeria. The study finds school enrollment to be significant. Therefore, the study recommends among other things that government expenditure should be increased to diminish infant mortality as well as enhance school enrolment.

Macro-economic determinants, maternal and infant SDG targets in Nigeria: Correlation and predictive modeling.

Unambiguously, Nigeria is off-track in achieving the health-related SDGs. Consequentially, this study aligns with SDG 3 which calls for "good health and wellbeing for people by ensuring healthy lives and promoting wellbeing for all at all ages". This article examines the combined effect of health expenditure and other key macro-economic factors on health indices such as maternal and newborn and child mortality in Nigeria. Contrary to existing literature, we formulated a model that predicts the level of macro-economic determinants needed to achieve the SDG targets for maternal and newborn and child mortality in Nigeria by 2030. The study used Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL), which is usually used for large T models. The study period spans from 1995 to 2020. We found a significant negative relationship between health outcomes and macro-economic determinants namely, household consumption, total health expenditure, and gross fixed capital while we determined a significant positive relationship between health outcomes and unemployment. Our findings are further supported by out-of-sample forecast results suggesting a reduction in unemployment to 1.84 percent and an increase in health expenditure, gross fixed capital, household consumption, control of corruption to 1,818.87 billon (naira), 94.46 billion (naira), 3.2 percent, and -4.2 percent respectively to achieve SDG health targets in Nigeria by 2030. The outcome of this result will give the Nigerian government and stakeholders a deeper understanding of the workings of the macro-economic factors, concerning health performance and will help position Nigeria, and other SSA countries by extension, toward reducing maternal mortality to 70 per 100,000 and newborn and child mortality to 25 per 1,000 births by 2030. The African leaders should consider passing into law the need for improvement in macro-economic factors for better health in Africa. We also recommend that the Nigerian government should steadily increase health expenditure to reach and move beyond the forecast level for improvement in maternal and infant mortality, given the present low and unimpressive funding for the health sector in the country.

The impact of objective and subjective valuations on behaviours: A case study of a rare earth processing plant

Despite the importance of rare earth elements in modern technologies, the establishment of rare earth plants often faces strong opposition from the community due to a fear of environmental impacts. This study examines information about actual and perceived pollution produced by a rare earth plant in Malaysia, Lynas Advanced Material Plant (LAMP), and the community's response to it. A survey of 570 respondents reveals that LAMP is perceived to have a high environmental impact in the long run, although its pollution levels are mostly below the limit set by the authorities. About 18% of respondents have undertaken averting behaviours (AB) such as protest, reduction in outdoor activities, and increased health expenditure. The estimated averting expenditure, excluding migration cost, is about 0.06% of household monthly income. Logit estimations show that perception is a significant determinant of AB, while Tobit estimations indicate that young, male, non-Malays and those exposed to poor surrounding air quality, low levels of trust and perceived high levels of environmental impact will incur additional cost. Rare earth companies and the authorities should therefore find ways to communicate with and gain trust from the locals to reduce their fear and to avoid unnecessary protective actions.

The Impact of Health Capital on Economic Growth in the Balkan Countries

This study estimates the impact of health capital on economic growth in 10 Balkan countries over the 2000-2019 period. We used panel autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) of a pooled mean group (PMG) to examine this relationship. Our results revealed that economic growth responds to short-term and long-term health capital changes. Estimation results indicate a positive relationship between health capital and the economic growth of Balkan countries. According to the results, increased health expenditure stimulates higher economic growth and development. The findings imply the need to formulate policies that assign higher priority to the healthcare sector, which would help sustain future economic growth in Balkan countries.

Health expenditures, environmental quality, and economic development: State-of-the-art review and findings in the context of COP26.

There are numerous factors that affect human health. Among others, environmental degradation, bad governance, and extensive economic growth are regarded as more destructive for health-related issues. To explore the nexus of the said factors and extend the scholarly literature, the current study aims to analyze the influence of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, governance indicators, and gross domestic product (GDP) on human health expenditures-captured by domestic health expenditures and capital health expenditures. Specifically, this study contrasted variables including regulatory quality (RQ), rule of law (RL), GDP, GHG emissions, and human capital (HC) with that of human health expenditure. Covering the period from 1996 to 2020, this study uses time series specifications in the case of China, which is one of the largest pollution-emitting economies across the globe. The empirical results found that the long-run equilibrium relationship exists between the variables. For the long-run coefficients, this study utilizes the fully modified ordinary least square, dynamic ordinary least square, and canonical cointegration regression, suggesting that economic development and RQ are adversely affecting human health expenditure. However, GHG emissions, RQ, and HC significantly improve human health by increasing health expenditure in China. Based on the empirical results, policies are suggested regarding human health improvement, improved governance quality, and environmental sustainability. The study discusses the empirical conclusions and implications as per COP26 declarations.