Web-economic-crisis-health-systems-and-health-web

Preface
This book maps health policy responses to the financial and economic crisis
in Europe by country so that policy-makers, researchers and others have access
to information about national contexts of particular interest to them. In a
separate book we draw on this information to analyse the impact of the crisis
across countries.
This book has two parts. The case studies in Part I provide a detailed description
and analysis of policy responses to the crisis in nine countries. The country
profiles in Part II provide short overviews of policy responses to the crisis in
47 countries.
Six of the case study countries were selected because they were relatively heavily
affected by the crisis and faced intense policy challenges (Estonia, Greece,
Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania and Portugal). Greece, Ireland and Portugal sought
international financial assistance, introduced significant cuts to public spending,
including in the health sector, and have experienced sustained negative
economic growth. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania experienced sharp declines
in gross domestic product at the start of the crisis and returned to growth
relatively quickly, but continue to suffer from high levels of unemployment.
The inclusion of case studies on Belgium, France and the Netherlands was
made possible by funding from the National Health Insurance Fund of Korea.
Although these countries were less heavily affected by the crisis than the other
six, they have also operated in a climate of diminished public sector spending
since 2008. Each case study was written by national experts and academic
researchers using a standard template. All of the studies underwent external
peer review to ensure analytical rigour and to strengthen their evidence base.
The country profiles are based on a survey of health policy experts carried
out in two waves. The first wave covered health system responses from late
2008 to the end of March 2011. The second wave involved a triangulation
process and gathered information from 2011 to the beginning of 2013. Experts
were identified through a purposive snowball sampling approach, for which
the starting point was an established network of international health systems
experts. Across the two waves, no information was available for Andorra,
Luxembourg, Monaco, San Marino and Turkmenistan.