Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/265715 
Year of Publication: 
2022
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 15494
Publisher: 
Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
In the first two quarters of 2013 the Georgian government introduced and fully implemented a universal health care (UHC) plan covering all those not-yet publicly or privately insured. We estimate the effect of the introduction of the universal healthcare plan on the level of out-of-pocket (OOP) health expenditures of households. We find that the program saved households an economically and statistically significant amount of 92 GEL per household/ month: a major effect, amounting to about 10% of the average household monthly income and 30% of the average individual monthly income at the time. The OOP payments reduction is almost totally attributed to people utilizing serious, emergency, or life-saving inpatient and outpatient services—lending support to the hypothesis that the UHC program, not only has reduced the OOP health expenditures, but it might have also improved the overall health status in the country.
Subjects: 
universal healthcare
out of pocket health expenditures
public health
health insurance
JEL: 
I13
I18
H51
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size
498.81 kB





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.