Health at a Glance: Europe 2016
State of Health in the EU Cycle
This fourth edition of Health at a Glance: Europe presents key indicators of health and health systems in the 28 EU countries, 5 candidate countries to the EU and 3 EFTA countries. This 2016 edition contains two main new features: two thematic chapters analyse the links between population health and labour market outcomes, and the important challenge of strengthening primary care systems in European countries; and a new chapter on the resilience, efficiency and sustainability of health systems in Europe, in order to align the content of this publication more closely with the 2014 European Commission Communication on effective, accessible and resilient health systems. This publication is the result of a renewed collaboration between the OECD and the European Commission under the broader "State of Health in the EU" initiative, designed to support EU member states in their evidence-based policy making.
Pharmaceutical expenditure
Pharmaceuticals play a vital role in the health system and policy makers must balance the access of patients to new effective medicines, while providing the right incentives to manufacturers to go on developing new generations of drugs. At the same time, health care budgets are limited. After inpatient and outpatient care, pharmaceuticals represent the third largest expenditure item of health care spending and accounted for around a sixth of health expenditure in the European Union in 2014, not taking into account spending on pharmaceuticals in hospitals.
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