Health spending starts to rise but remains weak in Europe, says OECD

Health spending has started to rise again after stagnating or even falling in many Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries during the crisis, but the pace of growth remains well below pre-crisis rates, especially in Europe, according to  OECD Health Statistics 2014.

In Europe, health spending continued to fall in 2012 in Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain, as well as in the Czech Republic and Hungary.  In Greece, health spending in real terms was 25% lower in 2012 than in 2009, primarily driven by cuts in public spending.