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

Kazakhstan
Ninel Kadyrova and Tata Chanturidze
Economic trends
• Although real per capita GDP growth slowed in 2008 and was slightly
negative in 2009, Kazakhstan has been largely unaffected by the crisis.
• Against the European trend, the unemployment rate has been decreasing.
• Total government spending on health is among the lowest in the European
region although there was a government budget surplus in every year of
the 2008 to 2011 period. Public per capita health spending, which had
grown every year with the exception of 2007, decreased slightly in 2011
(Kazakhstan: Fig. 1).
Policy responses
Kazakhstan Fig 2 gives the trends in per capita spending on health.
Changes to public funding for the health system
• Public spending on health more than doubled between 2007 and 2011.
Changes to health coverage
Population (entitlement)
• No response reported.
The benefits package
• Highly specialized medical services, diagnostic care and screening added to
the benefits package (2008–2012).
• List of benefit population entitled to outpatient prescription medicines free of
charge expanded (2011 onwards).
• The essential list of drugs replaced with a formulary system based on cost–
effectiveness criteria (2010).
User charges
• No response reported.