The Economic Consequences Of Mortality Amenable To High-Quality Health Care In Low- And Middle-Income Countries

Health Aff (Millwood). 2018 Jun;37(6):988-996. doi: 10.1377/hlthaff.2017.1233.

Abstract

We estimated deaths amenable to high-quality health care globally and then modeled the macroeconomic impact in low- and middle-income countries using two macroeconomic perspectives: a value-of-lost-output approach to project gross domestic product (GDP) losses annually for the period 2015-30, and a value-of-lost-welfare approach to estimate the present value of total economic welfare losses in 2015. We estimated that eight million amenable deaths occurred in 2015, 96 percent of them in low- and middle-income countries. The value of lost output resulted in a projected cumulative loss of $11.2 trillion in these countries during 2015-30, with a potential economic output loss of up to 2.6 percent of GDP in low-income countries by 2030, compared to 0.9 percent in upper-middle-income countries. The value-of-lost-welfare approach estimated welfare losses of $6.0 trillion in 2015. Inadequate access to high-quality health care results in significant mortality and imposes a macroeconomic burden that is inequitably distributed, with the largest relative burden falling on low-income countries. Given that these deaths are unnecessary and the projected GDP losses are avoidable, there is a strong ethical and economic case for promoting high-quality health care as an essential component of universal health coverage.

Keywords: Cost of Health Care; Developing World < International/global health studies; Disparities; Health Economics; International/global health studies.

MeSH terms

  • Developing Countries
  • Female
  • Global Health
  • Gross Domestic Product
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Mortality / trends*
  • Poverty / economics*
  • Quality of Health Care*
  • Social Welfare / economics*
  • Universal Health Insurance / economics*