Health Policies

High-performing health systems require improved data monitoring and indicators on quality of care, as well as  better policies to prevent disease, and improve health-system efficiency via care coordination and the implementation of information technologies. Our help also helps countries to design pharmaceutical policies, and address future health workforce and long-term care needs.


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More information on work on health across the OECD at www.oecd.org/health.

What's new

Expensive health care is not always the best health care, says OECD’s Health at a Glance

08-Dec-2009

New internationally comparable indicators on quality of care show progress in treating serious conditions such as cancer. However, despite increasing rates of chronic diseases such as asthma and diabetes, care for these conditions falls short of good practices in too many countries, resulting in deteriorating health and higher medical costs.

OECD Health Policy Studies - Achieving Better Value for Money in Health Care

12-Nov-2009

Rising public health care spending remains a problem in virtually all OECD and EU member countries. As a consequence, there is growing interest in policies that will ease this pressure through improved health system performance. This report report examines selected policies that may help countries better achieve the goal of improved health system efficiency and thus better value for money.

Internet update for OECD Health Data 2009 available now

05-Nov-2009

The Internet update for OECD Health Data 2009 has just been released. Go to the OECD Health Data Update page to download the file and access data updates, along with a fully revised hypertext for Definitions, Sources and Methods.OECD Health Data Updates: Data, Sources and Methods, and Software Updates.

Tracking the growth in Medical Tourism: OECD helps Ministers shape the debate

27-Oct-2009

International trade in health services has been attracting increasing attention from health analysts, public health policy makers, and trade and tourism promotion agencies but with relatively little data to inform them. This statement was made by David Morgan of the Health Division at a roundtable meeting of ministers of health and tourism at the Medical Tourism and Global Health Congress, Los Angeles, October 26th-28th, 2009.

Why does the United States spend so much more on health than other countries?

09-Oct-2009

The United States spent 16% of its national income (GDP) on health in 2007, which is by far, the highest share in the OECD and more than seven percentage points higher than the average of 8.9% in OECD countries. This presentation was given by Mark Pearson, Head of OECD Health Division, to the U.S Senate Special Committee on Aging.

Health Update No. 7 now available

10-Jul-2009

Issue 7 of Health Update looks at the question of health spending in the current economic crisis. It also features other key health-related projects throughout the OECD (including information and communication technology, healthy ageing, obesity and long term care) and the recent release of OECD Health Data 2009.

OECD Health Data 2009 – comparing health statistics across OECD countries

01-Jul-2009

The number of doctors per capita increased 2% per year on average across OECD countries between 1990 and 2007, but in some countries the trend is reversing. These are some of the findings from OECD Health Data 2009, the most comprehensive source of comparable statistics on health and health systems across the 30 OECD countries.

See more news and events… Top of page

Health at a Glance - Edition 2009

Health at a Glance 2009 - OECD Indicators

The looming crisis in the health workforce

Health Workforce and Migration Project

Policy Briefs


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