ARTICLE MAINTAINS THAT UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE SYSTEMS SHOULD ALSO
FOCUS ON SOCIAL AND POLITICAL SUSTAINABILITY AND NOT SOLELY ON FINANCE
Princeton, NJ—October 15, 2015—The
Elsevier Atlas Award will be presented to the authors of a
Value in Health article on November 10, 2015 at Bocconi University, Milan, Italy.
Value in Health is the official journal of the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (
ISPOR).
Elsevier’s virtual journal,
Atlas, selected the
Value in Health article, “
Sustaining Universal Health Coverage: The Interaction of Social, Political, and Economic Sustainability,” in May 2015. The article was written by Elio Borgonovi, PhD and Amelia Compagni, PhD of Bocconi University and published in the January/February 2013 issue of
Value in Health (Vol 16, Suppl).
In the paper, the authors urge policy makers to take social and political factors into account when developing universal health care systems. The authors maintain that universal health care – which provides all people equal access to health care regardless of income – is a human right and that governments need to shift their focus away from finance to provide it.
“Until now, discussions about universal health care have focused on economic sustainability; policy makers are concerned about how they’re going to pay for care,” said Professor Elio Borgonovi, lead author of the study from Bocconi University, Milan, Italy. “We think there’s a problem with looking at it this way: what about the issue of getting political consensus, or making sure that all people – rich and poor – have equal access?”
“The sustainability of health care has become a major issue for all countries, especially since the worldwide recession resulting from the global financial crisis in 2008,” says
Value in Health Co-Editor in Chief, Michael Drummond, PhD. “This paper notes that the responses to this problem have been primarily economic, by introducing cost-cutting measures or by changing financial incentives. The paper’s main contribution is that these attempts might be insufficient, or even counterproductive, since they represent a ‘one legged stool’ without also considering social and political sustainability. That is, apart from being cost-effective, health care systems need to be equitable, diverse, democratic and interconnected. There also needs to be the political will to sustain a major policy direction in healthcare. The Journal was pleased to publish this paper, which was part of a special issue called ‘Sustainability of Universal Health Coverage: Five Continents, Four Perspectives.’”
ISPOR offers an extensive range of additional resources on
health policy and research for those interested in further information on the topic that may found on the ISPOR website at
http://www.ispor.org/EducationalVideos/Index.aspx. The ISPOR 5
th Latin America Conference recently held in September 2015 in Santiago, Chile also focused on increased access to healthcare. Available presentation
content from this conference may be found at
http://www.ispor.org/Event/ReleasedPresentations/2015Santiago.
Atlas is a new online publication featuring a collection of recently published research from across Elsevier’s 1,800 journals. Each month,
Atlas showcases research that can (or already has) significantly impact people’s lives around the world. Articles are selected across four broad topics: People, Planet, Technology, and Resources. Every month, a single
Atlas article is selected by advisory board members from organizations such as Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), Health Informational For All – HIFA 2015, International Training and Outreach Center in Africa (ITOCA), University of California, Berkeley – Centre for Effective Global Action (CEGA), OXFAM and Bioversity International among others.
The award ceremony will be taking place concurrently with the ISPOR 18
th Annual
European Congress in Milan from November 7 – 11, 2015 at the MiCo – Milano Congressi.
Registration for the Congress is open and may be found at http://www.ispor.org/Event/Index/2015Milan.