French long-term treatment cost threat

Patients in France who suffer from one of 30 chronic con-ditions, including cancer, diabetes and HIV/AIDS, currently benefit from a health care regimen that covers their treatment costs in full. A new study by the Caisse nationale d'assurance maladie, the French national health insurance fund, has shown that 73.5% more people benefited from this scheme in 2004 than in 1994, reaching an estimated 6.6 million patients. In the case of diabetes, the increase was 83%. The CNAM estimates that the current figure is almost 8 million people.

The senior council on the future of the health insurance system (HCAAM), the government's advisory board on health insurance strategy, claims that the 10 million patient threshold could be reached by 2010, generating a sharp rise in health care costs. Spending on chronic illnesses alone accounts for 60% of the state's total reiumbursements.

According to the CNAM, this spending trend is due to the growing prevalence of chronic conditions, the increase in life expectancy (augmented by the relatively aging popu-lation) and the widening of the criteria for the reiumburse-ment of treatment costs.