Challenges for health systems in member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

For reasons of equity most OECD countries have chosen to base their funding of health care mainly on public sources. There is an almost universal problem of affordability in the health systems of these countries, arising from the tension between the willingness of populations to pay taxes and the eagerness of patients to use health services where these are free or heavily subsidized at the point of use. These tensions are likely to be exacerbated by a surge of new medical technologies adding to demands for health care. Some observers have predicted the breakdown of publicly funded systems of health care under new spending pressures. However, governments can deploy a range of policies for handling new demands. They can also take comfort from the fact that many of them have already coped with successive waves of technological change in health care without abandoning their core commitment to the public funding of health systems. Furthermore, if standards of living continue to rise, public and private insurers should find it easier to obtain the revenues needed to pay for the improved health care expected by consumers.