The level of per capita health spending – which captures both individual and population healthcare needs – and how this changes over time depends on a wide range of demographic, social and economic factors, as well as the financing and organisational arrangements of a country’s health system.
In 2024, average health spending in OECD countries was estimated to stand at nearly USD 6 000 per capita (when adjusted for differences in purchasing power). The United States was the highest spender – reaching the equivalent of over USD 14 880 per person, or 2.5 times the OECD average (Figure 7.4). Switzerland, Norway and Germany followed, with per capita health spending of around two‑thirds of the level of the United States (USD 9 300‑10 000). After that, a further group of Western European countries, as well as Australia and Canada, all spent between USD 7 000 and USD 8 500 per person. Spending levels broadly decreased across Southern, Central and Eastern European countries to the Latin American OECD Member countries, with spending in Mexico (USD 1 590) at around a quarter of the OECD average. Health spending in accession/partner countries Indonesia and India was less than USD 500 per capita.
Figure 7.4 also shows the split of health spending based on the type of healthcare coverage, either organised through government health schemes or compulsory insurance, or through voluntary arrangements such as private voluntary health insurance or direct payments by households (see section “Health expenditure by financing schemes”). On average, about three‑quarters of all health spending is financed through government or compulsory insurance schemes across OECD countries.
In the years leading up to the COVID‑19 pandemic, annual per capita spending on healthcare grew by an average of 2.7% across OECD countries (Figure 7.5). In the Baltic countries, Korea and Poland, average annual spending growth during 2014‑2019 was between 5% and 8%, while in France, Italy, Finland, Luxembourg and the Netherlands annual increases were much more moderate at less than 1% on average.
Between 2019 and 2024, average annual per capita spending growth in OECD countries took place at a similar rate (2.5%) than during the pre‑pandemic period, but with substantial year-on-year differences. Across the OECD, annual growth in real terms was 5% in 2020 and peaked at 8% in 2021 as governments mobilised funds to slow down and tackle the effects of the COVID‑19 pandemic. With countries transitioning out of this health emergency, health spending contracted by around 2.5% on average in OECD countries in 2022. It stagnated in 2023 before returning to robust growth at above 3% per capita in 2024 (Figure 7.2). Some of the recent trajectory can be explained by economic and geo-political challenges that affected countries’ ability to fund any additional spending on health in 2022 and 2023, as well as high inflation rates that were often eroding nominal spending increases (Mueller, Penn and Morgan, 2024[1]).
Trends in health spending growth diverged markedly across countries and regions between 2019‑2024 as the impact of the COVID‑19 pandemic and the cost-of-living and energy crises differed between health systems. In Japan and Denmark, for example, the real level of health spending per capita stagnated when comparing 2019 and 2024. While both countries recorded high spending growth in 2021 (8%), this was followed by a subsequent drop of a similar magnitude in the subsequent year(s), resulting in a compound zero growth rate. On the other hand, Türkiye and Poland saw particularly high increases in health spending between 2019 and 2024, with average annual real growth of 8‑10%. Slovenia, the Slovak Republic and Chile also recorded robust growth during this period, at around 4‑5% on average. Latvia followed a very particular spending trajectory – with an astounding real-term spending increase of 30% in 2021, followed by substantial cuts in the two subsequent years, resulting in a compound annual growth rate close to 3%. In contrast, many countries in Western and Northern Europe, such as France, Italy, Spain, Belgium and Sweden, saw only modest annual spending growth at around 1% on average – similar to or below pre‑pandemic period growth.
