Ireland recorded the European Union’s largest decline in health spending as a percentage of GDP in the eight years between 2014 and 2022 according to fresh data.
However the figures from Eurostat also suggest that expenditure on health in Ireland was among the highest in the EU in 2022 with only Denmark and Luxembourg spending more per person.
In 2022, an average of €3,685 per person was spent on current healthcare expenditure in the EU, an increase of 38.6 per cent compared with the 2014 figure of €2,658.
The data suggests healthcare expenditure increased in all EU countries between 2014 and 2022 with the highest average spending reported in Luxembourg on €6,590 per inhabitant ahead of Denmark on €6,110 and Ireland on €5,998.
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At the other end of the scale, the lowest expenditure was recorded in Romania where €858 was spent per person and Bulgaria where €990 was spent.
In 2022, in the EU, the ratio of current healthcare expenditure to GDP stood at 10.4 per cent with the highest relative expenditures recorded in Germany where 12.6 per cent of GDP was spent.
France was on 11.9 per cent of GDP while in Austria 11.2 of GDP was spent on healthcare.
By contrast, healthcare spending in Luxembourg was 5.6 per cent of GDP, in Romania it was 5.8 per cent and Ireland was in third place with 6.1 per cent of GDP spent on healthcare.
Only six EU countries reported a lower ratio of healthcare expenditure to GDP in 2022 compared with 2014.
The largest declines were reported in Ireland where a decrease of 3.4 percentage points was recorded while in Denmark the decrease was put at 0.8 points and half a point in the Netherlands.
Ireland recorded an increase in GDP well above the EU average in the period in question. However, GDP is considered a problematic measure of the Irish economy due to its structure, with the Central Statistics Office introducing GNI* (Modified Gross National Income) as a parallel measure to reflect economic activity without what it describes as “globalisation effects” due to multinational profits booked in the State.
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