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51. Aging Risk and Health Care Cost in Korea

Author:
Byong Ho Tchoe and Sang-Ho Nam
Publication Date:
02-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
Abstract:
It is generally perceived that health care cost is increasing because of population aging. In Korea, the number of people over 65 years of age was 3.1 percent of the population in 1970, 5.1 percent in 1990, 7.2 percent in 2000, and 9.1 percent in 2005. These figures show that the period of time in which an aging population increases by 2 percent is getting shorter; thus aging has been accelerating.
Topic:
Demographics and Health
Political Geography:
Israel, Asia, and Korea

52. The healer or the druggist: Effects of two health care policies in Taiwan on elderly patients' choice between physician and pharmacist services

Author:
Kang-Hung Chang
Publication Date:
03-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
Abstract:
When both physicians and pharmacists in Taiwan prescribed and dispensed drugs, many elderly people considered the two types of health care providers more or less synonymous (i.e., close substitutes). Two policies mandated in the 1990s changed this perception: National Health Insurance (NHI), which provides insurance coverage to all citizens, and a separation policy (SP) that forbids physicians from dispensing and pharmacists from prescribing drugs. The author finds that by providing an economic incentive to the previously uninsured elderly, NHI raised the probability that they would visit physicians, relative to their continuously insured counterparts. In particular, some previously uninsured elderly who once only visited pharmacists were more likely to also visit physicians after NHI was implemented. Following this, the SP made it more likely that all elderly patients would only visit physicians and buy drugs from on-site pharmacists hired by physicians—a result different than its policy goal.
Topic:
Demographics, Health, and Human Welfare
Political Geography:
Israel, Taiwan, and Asia

53. Allocation of control rights and cooperation efficiency in public-private partnerships: Theory and evidence from the Chinese pharmaceutical industry

Author:
Zhe Zhang, Ming Jia, and Difang Wan
Publication Date:
03-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
Abstract:
This article uses incomplete contract theory to study the allocation of control rights in public-private partnerships (PPPs) between pharmaceutical enterprises and nonprofit organizations; it also investigates how this allocation influences cooperation efficiency. We first develop a mathematic model for the allocation of control rights and its influence on cooperation efficiency, and then derive some basic hypotheses from the model. The results of an empirical test show that the allocation of control rights influences how enterprises invest in PPPs. A proper allocation provides incentives for firms to make fewer self-interested and more public-interested investments. Such an allocation also improves the cooperation efficiency of PPPs.
Topic:
Demographics, Health, and Human Welfare
Political Geography:
China, Israel, and Asia

54. AIDS Treatment in South Asia: Equity and Efficiency Arguments for Shouldering the Fiscal Burden When Prevalence Rates Are Low

Author:
Mead Over
Publication Date:
02-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
The slower spread of AIDS in South Asian countries, combined with the fact that most South Asian countries have higher per capita incomes than the most severely affected countries of other regions imply that the various impacts of the disease will be smaller in South Asia than in the worst affected countries in other regions. While justified with respect to the impact of the disease on economic output, on poverty, or on orphanhood, this conclusion does not follow with respect to the health sector, where the relatively minor public role in health care delivery and the entrepreneurial and heterogeneous private health and pharmaceutical sectors combine to magnify the potential impact of the epidemic.
Topic:
Health and Humanitarian Aid
Political Geography:
South Asia and Asia

55. Rice Crisis Forensics: How Asian Governments Carelessly Set the World Rice Market on Fire

Author:
Tom Slayton
Publication Date:
03-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
The world rice market was aflame last spring and for several months it looked as if the trading edifice that had exhibited such resilience over the last two decades was going to burn to the ground. World prices trebled within less than four months and reached a 30- year inflation-adjusted high. Many market observers thought the previous record set in 1974 would soon be toast. The fire was man-made, not the result of natural developments. While the governments in India, Vietnam, and the Philippines did not to set the world market on fire, that was the unintended result of their actions which threatened both innocent bystanders (low-income rice importers as far away as Africa and Latin America) and, ultimately, poor rice consumers at home. This paper describes what sparked the fire and the accelerants that made a bad situation nearly catastrophic. Fortuitously, when the flames were raging at peak intensity, rain clouds appeared, the winds [market psychology] shifted, and conditions on the ground improved, allowing the fire to die down. It remains to be seen, however, if the trading edifice has been seriously undermined by the actions of decision makers in several key Asian rice exporting and importing countries. In describing the cascading negative effects of these seemingly rational domestic policies, this paper aims to help policy makers in the rice exporting and importing nations to avoid a repeat of the disastrous price spike of 2008.
Topic:
Agriculture, Economics, Health, Humanitarian Aid, Markets, and Political Economy
Political Geography:
Africa, India, Asia, and Latin America

56. Health-Care Reform in Georgia: A Civil-Society Perspective

Author:
Tobias Hauschild and Esmé Berkhout
Publication Date:
06-2009
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Oxfam Publishing
Abstract:
This report aims to identify key challenges arising from reform of the health-care system in Georgia, especially in primary health care, and to present some possible strategies to address them. It will be a useful reference document for Oxfam, our partners, and all those concerned with improving the provision of health care in Georgia.
Topic:
Civil Society, Health, and Reform
Political Geography:
Eastern Europe, Asia, and Georgia

57. Soft budget constraints in China: Evidence from the Guangdong hospital industry

Author:
Karen Eggleston, Mingshan Lu, Congdong Li, Jian Wang, Zhe Yang, Jing Zhang, and Yu-Chu Shen
Publication Date:
03-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
Abstract:
Using data from 276 general acute hospitals in the Pearl River Delta region of Guangdong Province from 2002 and 2004, we construct a preliminary metric of budget constraint softness. We find that, controlling for hospital size, ownership, and other factors, a Chinese hospital's probability of receiving government financial support is inversely associated with the hospital's previous net revenue, an association consistent with soft budget constraints.
Topic:
Government, Health, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
China and Asia

58. Out-of-pocket household health expenditures and their use in National Health Accounts: Evidence from Pakistan

Author:
Christian Lorenz
Publication Date:
08-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
Abstract:
Out-of-pocket (OoP) household health expenditures are among the most difficult factors to measure in the context of National Health Accounts (NHA). Yet their measurement is important: OoP household expendi-tures are typically the first or second largest source of health care financing in developing countries. Their incorrect measurement can undermine the credibility of total health spending estimates and thus NHA statistics, which are an otherwise important resource for policy makers. In most countries, private expenditures account for the biggest margin of error in national health spending estimates and represent the most substantial barrier to reliable international comparisons. Differences in accounting methods explain much of the discrepancy across nations. To further the academic investigation of this important issue, this paper focuses on OoP household health expenditures in Pakistan's NHA and suggests steps toward estimating such expenditures more effectively.
Topic:
Health
Political Geography:
Pakistan, South Asia, and Asia

59. The Emerging Role of Private Health Care Provision in China

Author:
Cunrui Huang, Haocai Liang, Cordia Chu, Shannon Rutherford, and Qingshan Geng
Publication Date:
09-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
Abstract:
China continues to face great challenges in meeting the health needs of its large population. The challenges are not just lack of resources, but also how to use existing resources more efficiently, more effectively, and more equitably. Now a major unaddressed challenge facing China is how to reform an inefficient, poorly organized health care delivery system. The objective of this study is to analyze the role of private health care provision in China and discuss the implications of increasing private-sector development for improving health system performance.
Topic:
Government and Health
Political Geography:
China and Asia

60. OEF Commentary on Avian Flu

Publication Date:
01-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Oxford Economics
Abstract:
OEF has regularly provided scenario assessments of the economic impact of a wide range of risks to the global outlook from financial market volatility to banking crises to country studies to threats arising from less economy-based disturbances such as earthquake damage and the impact of health scares like the UK's foot and mouth outbreak and Asia's SARS attack of 2003.
Topic:
Economics, Globalization, Health, and Infectious Diseases
Political Geography:
Europe and Asia