 |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
Suicides, outbreaks of HIV infections, malaria and other diseases are becoming more common. In an article published in The Lancet on 27 March, a group of experts review the early impacts of austerity measures on health in Europe.
Greece, Spain, and Portugal adopted strict fiscal austerity; their economies continue to recede and strain on their health-care systems is growing. Suicides and outbreaks of infectious diseases are becoming more common in these countries, and budget cuts have restricted access to health care. This is also true of the UK which is following the same path of austerity measures.
By contrast, Iceland rejected austerity through a popular vote, and the financial crisis seems to have had few or no discernible effects on health and welfare in that country.
Although there are many potentially confounding differences between countries, the analysis suggests that, although recessions pose risks to health, the interaction of fiscal austerity with economic shocks and weak social protection is what ultimately seems to escalate health and social crises in Europe. Policy decisions about how to respond to economic crises have pronounced and unintended effects on public health, yet public health voices have remained largely silent during the economic crisis.
The authors have detected a decline in the health of populations in some countries where austerity is harshest. In Greece, the troika (European Commission, IMF and ECB) has demanded that public spending on health be capped at 6% of GDP. That has translated into a 50% cut in central social security fund administrative staff, a reduction in public hospital beds from 35 000 to 33 000, and the elimination or merging of 370 specialist units.
The proportion of people who felt that they needed but did not access medical care rose significantly, the researchers found. This clearly plays into the resurgence of malaria and dengue fever outbreaks in Greece. Stopping needle exchange programmes has led to a huge rise in new cases of HIV infection among injecting drug users. There is also evidence of worsening mental health, with a 40% rise in suicides between January and May 2011.
In Portugal, winter deaths in people older than 75 years increased by 10% in 2012 compared with 2011, while Spain has seen swingeing cuts in hospital bed numbers in some parts of the country.
"What this research shows is that austerity measures have only widened the gulf in social inequalities in health that existed before the onset of the crisis. Health has become an unaffordable luxury for the most vulnerable groups", commented ETUI researcher Laurent Vogel.
Further environmental changes taking place because of global warming, brings the threat of diseases previously unknown in the UK with malaria being a prime example.
We have already seen resurgence in tuberculosis in the UK
and with a massive increase in food banks, the health amongst those forced to use them as their primary source of nutrition; bring on risks of health conditions such as scurvy, rickets, osteoporosis and general malnutrition amongst the working and middle classes in the UK population.
Add to this cauldron of risks facing the population in this country, attacks on health and safety legislation, public health and the enforcing authorities; and you can clearly see a disturbing pattern of related policies conspiring to increase levels of injury, ill health and death within Europe and the UK.
Further reading: Financial crisis, austerity, and health in Europe
Source: The Lancet
|
|
|
|
|
Designed, Hosted and Maintained by Union Safety Services
|
|
|
