Skip to main content

Economic crisis, austerity and unmet healthcare needs: the case of Greece

Abstract

Background

The programme for fiscal consolidation in Greece has led to income decrease and several changes in health policy. In this context, this study aims to assess how economic crisis affected unmet healthcare needs in Greece.

Methods

Time series analysis was performed for the years 2004 through 2011 using the EU-SILC database. The dependent variable was the percentage of people who had medical needs but did not use healthcare services. Median income, unemployment and time period were used as independent variables. We also compared self-reported unmet healthcare needs drawn from a national survey conducted in pre-crisis 2006 with a similar survey from 2011 (after the onset of the crisis). A common questionnaire was used in both years to assess unmet healthcare needs, including year of survey, gender, age, health status, chronic disease, educational level, income, employment, health insurance status, and prefecture. The outcome of interest was unmet healthcare needs due to financial reasons. Ordinary least squares, as well as logistic regression analysis were conducted to analyze the results.

Results

Unmet healthcare needs increased after the enactment of austerity measures, while the year of participation in the survey was significantly associated with unmet healthcare needs. Income, educational level, employment status, and having insurance, private or public, were also significant determinants of unmet healthcare needs due to financial reasons.

Conclusions

The adverse economic environment has significantly affected unmet health needs. Therefore health policy actions and social policy measures are essential in order to mitigate the negative impact on access to healthcare services and health status.

Background

In 2010, the Greek economy was placed under the surveillance of the European Commission, the European Central Bank, and the International Monetary Fund when the Hellenic Republic signed onto the first Economic Adjustment Programme (EAP) [1]. The programme included several fiscal measures and structural reforms aimed at reducing the general government and current account deficit and achieving public debt sustainability in the long run. The Greek economy entered a phase of severe recession, characterized by high unemployment and reduction of GDP [2]. The EAP included several measures, including significant wage and pension reductions as well as tax increases. Generally, the measures implemented since May 2010 can be characterized as a process of “internal devaluation” [3].

Several studies have noticed the adverse impact of economic crisis on health and healthcare. Specifically, recent publications suggest that the current economic crisis is associated with a drop in self-rated health status [4], a negative impact of the crisis on health trends [5] and difficulties on health promotion and public health policies [6]. Apart from the negative impact on health, economic crisis has adversely affected healthcare services [7, 8].

Unmet needs consist an indicator of equity and accessibility to healthcare services [9, 10] and they can be defined as “the differences, if any, between those services judged necessary to deal appropriately with defined health problems and those services actually being received” [11], while the scarcity of resources makes them inevitable [12].

During economic crises, the demand for healthcare services and the utilization of such services follows the general drop in socioeconomic status [1315]. Such change may reflect barriers to access due to increased unemployment and reductions in disposable income [16, 17]. Even during periods of economic stability and growth, an individual’s inability to pay for healthcare services may result in unmet health needs [9]. Indeed, several studies indicate that unmet healthcare needs have increased in Greece [18], and it is expected that this trend will continue [19]. Generally, economic crises are associated with lower labour demand, disposable income reduction, problems on health financing and deterioration of access to healthcare [20]. Therefore, the research hypothesis of this study is associated with the extent to which unmet healthcare needs due to financial reasons have increased, and the characteristics of the socioeconomic groups that mainly face the unmet needs in Greece.

Estimating how unmet healthcare needs differ between periods of stability and periods of austerity is an under-studied question with real consequences for the health status of the population. In this context, the aim of the present study is to assess the impact of the economic crisis in Greece on the unmet healthcare needs.

Methods

The analysis is based on annual time series data from the EU-SILC study from 2004 to 2011, which are publicly available [21]. The dependent variable was the percentage of people who had medical needs but did not use healthcare services. Independent variables were time [coded as 0:2004–2007 (no crisis), 1:2008–2009 (crisis starting, no austerity measures) and 2:2010–2011 (crisis with austerity measures in effect), median income, and unemployment. Initially we used the augmented Dickey-Fuller test to see if the variables were stationary. Given that the variables presented unit roots, we tested if the residuals of the ordinary least squares (OLS) model presented unit roots (without constant and trend). Since testing confirmed that regression residuals had no unit roots, regression was judged as non-spurious, and the variables co-integrated. A final model choice was based on the information criteria in AIC and BIC. We also tested for normality and heteroskedasticity of the residuals with the skewness and kurtosis test and the Breusch-Pagan/Cook-Weisberg test, as well as performed a link test to check for specification error. Finally, we tested for autocorrelation of standardized residuals via Durbin’s alternative test.

To study the effect of the financial crisis, controlling for other socioeconomic variables on the outcome of interest, namely the reason for unmet healthcare needs, we merged data from the two national surveys from 2006 to 2011 that were conducted by the National School of Public Health [22]. The sample sizes were 4003 in 2006 (n2006 = 4003), and 6569 in 2011 (n2011 = 6569, ntotal 2006 & 2011 = 10,572), and they were both selected randomly based on stratification according to prefecture (based on the residence of the respondents), degree of urbanity based on NUTS II, age, and gender. Subjects were asked to report on experiences during the preceding year. Both surveys used a common questionnaire based on World Health Organization methodology [23] that had been validated in the past, and data collection involved a personal interview. In 2006 the interviews were conducted in the home of the respondents whereas in 2011 the interviews were conducted by telephone.

The final sample that we used for the analysis included 3120 patients who reported unmet needs. Specifically, 1243 of them were men (39.84 %), and the remaining 1877 were women (60.16 %), while the median age was 45 years. Among those who had stated that they have a medical need, 894 respondents (28.65 %) identified financial reason for not seeking care, whereas 2226 individuals (71.35 %) identified another reason for unmet healthcare needs. More details for the final sample used in the analysis are presented in Table 1.

Table 1 Distribution of unmet healthcare needs due to financial reasons per year

The analysis focused on those participants who reported a medical or healthcare need, but no healthcare utilization. The outcome was dichotomized to 1 for unmet healthcare needs due to financial reasons, and to 0 for unmet healthcare needs due to other reasons. The final sample size was n2006 & 2011 = 3120 (n2006 = 1259, n2011 = 1861). We gained permission to access this dataset from the Department of Health Economics, National School of Public Health.

Continuous variables were used as such, and Helmert coding was used for ordered variables, including education and income level. Various dummy variables were created for the nominal variables of employment and prefecture.

Statistical analysis was carried out in STATA 9.0. We used multiple logistic regression (MLR) to assess the effect of the main variable (year of participation) on the outcome (reason for unmet healthcare needs) controlling for various potential predictors or confounders. Potential predictors (independent variables) in the model were the following: a) gender (1: female, 2: male); b) age; c) self-reported health status (1: very bad, 2: bad, 3: medium, 4: good, 5: very good); d) existence of chronic health condition (1: no, 2: yes); e) education level (1: no education, 2: elementary school, 3: high school, 4: post high school and/or technical vocational education, 5: higher education, 6: university, 7: post-graduate education); f) income level (1: no income, 2: 1–500€, 3: 501–1000€, 4: 1001–1500€, 5: 1501–2000€, 6: 2001–3000€ and 7: 3001€+); g) employment status (1: working, 2: unemployed, 3: retiree, 4: homemaker 5: student or soldier, 6: other); h) public social security health insurance (1: yes, 2: no); i) private health insurance (1: yes, 2: no); j) urbanity status of permanent residence (1: rural, 2: urban); k) geographic prefecture (1: Attica, 2: East Macedonia and Thrace, 3: West Macedonia, 4: Central Macedonia, 5: Epirus, 6: Thessaly, 7: West Greece, 8: Central Greece, 9: Islands of Northern Aegean, 10: Islands of Southern Aegean, 11: Peloponnese, 12: Ionian Islands, 13: Crete); and l) year of survey (0: 2006, 1:2011). The appropriateness and fit of the final models were checked using several diagnostic methods, such as: i) link test, to test if the model suffers from specification error; ii) Hosmer and Leme show goodness of fit criterion; iii) skewness and kurtosis test of normality of the deviance residuals; and, iv) Brown and Forsythe test for the homoskedacity of the deviance residuals. ROC curves were fitted to explore the interpretation value of the models.

Results

According to the model, the increase in unmet healthcare needs after the implemented austerity measures was statistically significant. In addition, according to the link test results, the model does not suffer from specification error (Table 2).

Table 2 Augmented Dickey-fuller test for unit roots

Based on the Augmented Dickey-Fuller test for unit roots, all the variables (year, median income, unemployment) we examined for the time series analysis presented unit roots (Table 3).

Table 3 OLS model results

However, the final OLS model residuals (Table 4) did not present unit roots (Table 5). Thus, we conclude that the final model check led to co-integrated variables and to a regression model that is not spurious. Moreover, the model demonstrated a good fit, because the assumptions for the regression were satisfied. Residuals were found to follow a normal distribution (pskewness& Kurtosis = 0.86) and residuals were homoskedastic (pbreusch-pagan/cook-weisberg = 0.85). In addition, Durbin’s alternative test (p = 0.77) indicates no serial correlation of the residuals.

Table 4 Augmented Dickey-fuller test for unit roots of the residuals
Table 5 Link test (OLS model)

According to the MLR model, the year of participation was significantly associated with unmet healthcare needs due to financial reasons. More specifically, the odds of non-utilization of healthcare services due to financial reasons was 44 % higher in 2011 compared with 2006 (OR = 1.44), controlling for other socioeconomic predictors of utilization. Income, educational level, employment status and insurance were also significant.

Participants of the lower income group who were in need of medical care were 2.65 times more likely to be in front of unmet needs due to financial reasons, as compared with participants in the next income group (OR = 2.65). Similarly, the MLR model indicates that the lower the income, the higher the odds of unmet needs occurrence. The results are analytically described in Table 6.

Table 6 MLR model results

Moreover, higher likelihood of not expressing the need into utilization due to financial reasons was noted for subjects that were illiterate (OR = 1.73) or for subjects that had received elementary school education (OR = 2.09), as compared with participants who reported higher education. It is also noteworthy that the employment status affects the likelihood of unmet needs due to financial reasons. Specifically, the odds of unmet needs due to financial reasons for unemployed increased by 49 % compared with people who were employed and in need of care at the time of the interview.

Additionally, the presence of insurance (public or private) is also statistically significant, that is, insurance offers protection against lack of healthcare utilization. Having an unmet healthcare need due to financial reasons was lower among those individuals with private insurance (OR = 0.71) and even lower among those with public insurance (OR = 0.45). Details are presented in Table 6.

Model diagnostics via the link test revealed that the model does not suffer from specification error since hat is statistically significant but hat2 is not statistically significant, as shown in Table 7. The ROC curve revealed that the model’s interpretation value is acceptable since the area under the curve is 0.73 (Fig. 1). Further, the model demonstrated a good fit since the p-value for Hosmer-Lemeshow was 0.92. Assumptions for the regression were satisfied; deviance residuals were found to follow a normal distribution (pskewness& kurtosis=0.09 > 0.05), with constant variance (pbrown & foresythe = 0.73 > 0.05).

Table 7 Link test (MLR model)
Fig. 1
figure 1

ROC curve

Discussion

The aforementioned suggest that unmet healthcare needs increased after the enactment of austerity measures in Greece, mainly due to patients' difficulty to cover the costs of medical care. Generally, the cost of medical care is regarded as one of the main predictors of non-utilization [24, 25].

As mentioned previously, the odds of unmet needs due to financial reasons were 44 % higher in 2011 as compared with 2006. It is noteworthy that this finding is consistent with previous findings, which mention that healthcare utilization drops during economic crises, especially because of the presence of financial barriers [26, 27]. Recent findings from Greece also mention that financial barriers in access for chronic patients increased during the period of the economic crisis [28].

Generally, our results imply that unmet medical needs due to financial reasons are associated with income and health insurance, namely that low-income individuals, unemployed and uninsured are more likely to face unmet needs.

Low socioeconomic status is significantly associated with unmet needs due to financial reasons. Indicatively, we found that the lower the income, the higher the odds of unmet medical needs due to financial reasons. Another study has also found that income is considered as an important determinant of health services utilization in Greece, by estimating the income elasticity of utilization [29].

The impact of educational level is present but limited, given that it presents statistical significance on lower educational level, but not to the higher ones. A recent publication has also reported that individuals who have accomplished post-secondary education are associated with lower odds of unmet needs due to financial reasons in Greece [30].

Similarly, the presence of health insurance leads to lower odds of unmet healthcare needs. These findings are in line with several publications, which indicate that the absence of health insurance presents a strong correlation with unmet health needs [12, 31, 32].

In accordance with the aforementioned, many studies have noted the relationship between healthcare services utilization and income, education, employment status, or characteristics of health system (such as health insurance) [3336]. Moreover, low socioeconomic status has also been found to predict non-utilization of healthcare services [37, 38].

In addition, the present analysis examined the effect of gender, age, and health-related variables (self-reported health status, existence of a chronic disease) on healthcare utilization. While the above variables determine the degree of need [39], none of them presented a statistically significant relationship with unmet healthcare needs due to financial reasons. In a similar fashion, degree of urbanity and prefecture, variables that may be used as proxies for access to care, did not have a significant effect. However, Kentikelenis et al. have found that gender and urbanity affects the odds of facing unmet needs due to financial reasons [30].

This analysis implies that economic aspects constitute the forefront of healthcare utilization. Specifically, income, unemployment and uninsurance are key variables affecting the probability of unmet health needs occurrence. If the economic variables were not the predominant predictors of unmet needs, one would expect non-economic variables such as the existence of a chronic disease to lead to significantly higher odds of utilization among low socioeconomic subjects. This specific finding is strengthened by empirical observations documenting the relationship between self-reported health status, socioeconomic status, and the negative impact that financial crises exert at the population’s health status [40, 41].

Our findings validate previous findings reported in the existing literature, which reports that a need for care in segments of the population is not expressed during periods of economic crisis and recession [42]. The phenomenon of non-utilization of healthcare services among those in need of care seems to reflect reduction in disposable income due to unemployment and drastic cuts in salaries and pensions [43, 44]. This inability to seek care ultimately leads to poverty, social marginalization and adverse effects on health [45].

Unmet healthcare needs and access to healthcare constitute a significant issue that should be addressed in Greece. However, a significant question relates to how unmet healthcare needs potentially affect health outcomes. Generally, it is widely acknowledged that healthcare services constitute a limited predictor of health outcomes. Apart from access and use of health services, the determinants of health include income, education, social status, lifestyle, physical environment, social support networks, genetics, and gender [46]. There is ample evidence about the effects of economic downturn on health, in Greece [4, 5, 19] and internationally [44, 47]. Therefore, although our findings illustrate a problematic dimension regarding healthcare service, the extent of the adverse impact of unmet healthcare needs on health outcomes remains unanswered.

As with any study of this kind, the present analysis has limitations. For instance, the analysis does not capture the period 2012–2015, during which there was deep recession and several measures were implemented. Moreover the time series consists of limited observations. Ideally, panel data analysis would be technically preferable, however there is not a comprehensive database for such an analysis. It is also noteworthy that self-reported unmet health needs are an indicator of access to healthcare; however the extent to which unmet needs are associated with barriers to access or individual preferences is a crucial aspect. Therefore, several other access indicators should also be examined for obtaining an holistic view regarding access to healthcare [9]. Another conceptual limitation in the studies of this kind relates to what is meant by “healthcare needs”. In this case, the data were derived by Eurostat and the National School of Public Health Survey. Both examined the self-reported unmet healthcare needs.

Conclusions

According to the aforementioned, unmet health needs due to financial reasons have increased during the last years. Moreover, the odds of facing unmet health needs are higher for unemployed, uninsured and low-income patients. Therefore, given that this period is characterized by high unemployment, uninsurance and low incomes, targeted social policy measures towards the vulnerable population groups are timely and of great importance. In addition, the role of health policy is crucial in terms of reducing the adverse impact of unmet health needs and the potential implications on access to medical care and population health.

Abbreviations

AIC, Akaike Information Criterion; BIC, Bayesian Information Criterion; EAP, Economic Adjustment Programme; EU-SILC, European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions; GDP, Gross Domestic Product; OLS, ordinary least squares; OR, odds ratio

References

  1. European Commission. The Economic Adjustment Programme for Greece. 2010. http://ec.europa.eu/economy_finance/publications/occasional_paper/2010/pdf/ocp61_en.pdf. Accessed 10 Nov 2014.

    Google Scholar 

  2. European Commission. The Second Economic Adjustment Programme for Greece-Third Review. 2013. http://ec.europa.eu/economy_finance/publications/occasional_paper/2013/pdf/ocp159_en.pdf. Accessed 10 Nov 2014.

    Google Scholar 

  3. De Grauwe P. In search of symmetry in the Eurozone. 2012. http://www.ceps.eu/book/search-symmetry-eurozone. Accessed 11 Nov 2014.

    Google Scholar 

  4. Zavras D, Tsiantou V, Pavi E, Mylona K, Kyriopoulos J. Impact of economic crisis and other demographic and socio-economic factors on self-rated health in Greece. Eur J Public Health. 2013;23:206–10.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  5. Vandoros S, Hessel P, Leone T, Avendano M. Have health trends worsened in Greece as a result of the financial crisis? A quasi-experimental approach. Eur J Public Health. 2013;23:727–31.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  6. Ifanti AA, Argyriou AA, Kalofonou FH, Kalofonos HP. Financial crisis and austerity measures in Greece: their impact on health promotion policies and public health care. Health Policy. 2013;113:8–12.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  7. Kyriopoulos J, Tsiantou V. The financial crisis and its impact on health and medical care. Archives of Hellenic Medicine. 2010;27:834–40.

    Google Scholar 

  8. Kondilis E, Giannakopoulos S, Gavana M, Ierodiakonou I, Waitzkin H, Benos A. Economic crisis, restrictive policies, and the population’s health and health care: the Greek case. Am J Public Health. 2013;103:973–9.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  9. Allin S, Masseria C. Unmet need as an indicator of health care access. Eurohealth. 2009;15:7–10.

    Google Scholar 

  10. OECD. Health at a Glance 2011: OECD Indicators. 2011. http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/health_glance-2011-en. Accessed 13 Sept 2014

  11. Carr W, Wolfe S. Unmet needs as sociomedical indicators. Int J Health Serv. 1976;6:322 417–430.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Allin S, Grignon M, Le Grand J. Subjective unmet need and utilization of health care services in Canada: What are the equity implications? Soc Sci Med. 2010;70:465–72.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  13. Kim H, Chung WJ, Song YJ, Kang DR, Yi JJ, Nam CM. Changes in morbidity and medical care utilization after the recent economic crisis in the Republic of Korea. Bull World Health Organ. 2003;81:567–72.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  14. Waters H, Saadah F, Pradhan M. The impact of the 1997–98 East Asian economic crisis on health and health care in Indonesia. Health Policy Plan. 2003;18:172–81.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  15. Kaplan GA. Economic crises: some thoughts on why, when and where they (might) matter for health-A tale for three countries. Soc Sci Med. 2012;74:643–6.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  16. Musgrove P. The economic crisis and its impact on health and health care in Latin America and the Caribbean. Int J Health Serv. 1987;17:411–41.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  17. Yang BM, Prescott N, Bae EY. The impact of economic crisis on healthcare consumption in Korea. Health Policy Plan. 2001;16:373–85.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Kentikelenis A, Karanikolos M, Papanicolas I, Basu S, McKee M, Stuckler D. Health effects of financial crisis: omens of a Greek tragedy. Lancet. 2011;378:1457–8.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  19. Pappa E, Kontodimopoulos N, Papadopoulos A, Tountas Y, Niakas D. Investigating unmet health needs in primary health care services in a representative sample of the Greek population. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2013;10:2017–27.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  20. Drydakis N. The effect of unemployment on self-reported health and mental health in Greece from 2008 to 2013; A longitudinal study before and during the financial crisis. Soc Sci Med. 2015;128:43–51.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  21. Eurostat. Self-reported unmet needs for medical care. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/tgm/refreshTableAction.do?tab=table&plugin=1&pcode=tsdph270&language=en. Accessed 10 Jan 2014

  22. Research on Health and Healthcare Services in Greece. Department of Health Economics, National School of Public Health. http://www.esdy.edu.gr/default.aspx?page=toy_ereynes_toy. Accessed 9 Jan 2014

  23. WHO. WHO multi-country survey study on health and responsiveness 2000–2001. http://www.who.int/healthinfo/survey/whspaper37.pdf. Accessed 8 Jan 2014

  24. Nelson CH, Park J. The nature and correlates of unmet needs in Ontario, Canada. Soc Sci Med. 2006;62:2291–300.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  25. Sibley LM, Glazier RH. Reasons for self-reported unmet healthcare needs in Canada: a population-based provincial comparison. Healthcare Policy. 2009;5:87–101.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  26. Currie J, Tekin E. Is there a link between foreclosure and health? 2011. http://www.nber.org/papers/w17310.pdf?new_window=1. Accessed 5 Jan 2014.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  27. Lusardi A, Schneider DJ, Tufano P. The economic crisis and medical care usage. 2010. http://www.nber.org/papers/w15843.pdf?new_window=1. Accessed 5 Jan 2014.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  28. Kyriopoulos II, Zavras D, Skroumpelos A, Mylona K, Athanasakis K, Kyriopoulos J. Barriers in access to healthcare services for chronic patients in times of austerity: an empirical approach in Greece. Int J Equity Health. 2014. doi:10.1186/1475-9276-13-54.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  29. Mergoupis T. Income and Utilization of Health Services in Greece. In: Venieris D, Papatheodorou C, editors. Social Policy in Greece: Challenges and Prospects. Athens: Ellinika Grammata; 2003 (in Greek).

    Google Scholar 

  30. Kentikelenis A, Karanikolos M, Reeves A, McKee M, Stuckler D. Greece’s health crisis: from austerity to denialism. Lancet. 2014;383:748–53.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  31. Pagan JA, Pauly MV. Community-level uninsurance and the unmet medical needs of insured and uninsured adults. Health Serv Res. 2006;41:788–803.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  32. Newacheck PW, Hung YY, Park J, Brindis CD, Irwin CEJ. Disparities in adolescent health and health care-does SES matter? Health Serv Res. 2003;38:1235–52.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  33. Phelps CE, Newhouse JP. Coinsurance and the Demand for Medical Services. 1974. http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/reports/2007/R964-1.pdf. 10 Jan 2014

  34. Newhouse JP, Marquis SE. The norms hypothesis & the demand for medical care. J Hum Resour. 1978;13:159–82.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  35. Wagstaff A. The demand for health: some new empirical evidence. J Health Econ. 1986;5:195–233.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  36. Marmot M, Wilkinson R. Social Determinants of Health. Oxford: Oxford University Press; 1999.

    Google Scholar 

  37. Geitona M, Zavras D, Kyriopoulos J. Determinants of healthcare utilization in Greece: implications for decision-making. Eur J Gen Pract. 2007;13:144–50.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  38. Lemstra M, Mackenbach J, Neudorf C, Nannapaneni U. High health care utilization and costs associated with lower socio-economic status: results from a linked dataset. Canadian J Public Health. 2009;100:180–3.

    Google Scholar 

  39. Andersen RM. Revisiting the behavioral model and access to health care: does it matter? J Health Soc Behav. 1995;36:1–10.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  40. Cutler DM, Knaul F, Lozano R, Mendez O, Zurita B. Financial crisis, health outcomes and ageing: Mexico in the 1980s and 1990s. J Public Econ. 2002;84:279–303.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  41. Stuckler D, Basu S, Suhrcke M, McKee. The health implications of financial crisis: A review of the evidence. Ulster Med J. 2009;78:142–5.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  42. Cavagnero E, Bilger M. Equity during an economic crisis: financing of the Argentina health system. J Health Econ. 2010;29:479–88.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  43. Hotchkiss DR, Jacobalis S. Indonesian health care and the economic crisis: is managed care the needed reform? Health Policy. 1999;46:195–216.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  44. Karanikolos M, Mladovsky P, Cylus J, Thompson S, Basu S, Stuckler D, Mackenbach JP, McKee M. Financial crisis, austerity, and health in Europe. Lancet. 2013;381:1323–31.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  45. Protecting pro-poor health services during financial crises: lessons from experience [http://siteresources.worldbank.org/HEALTHNUTRITIONANDPOPULATION/Resources/ProtectingProPoorFC.pdf]

  46. WHO. The determinants of health [http://www.who.int/hia/evidence/doh/en/]

  47. Stuckler D, Basu S. The Body Economic: Why austerity kills. London: Penguin Press; 2013.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Mrs. Pat Levine for her help with editing the document. We also thank the editor and the two reviewers for their useful comments. All errors are our own.

Funding

No funding to declare.

Availability of data and material

We used the publicly available dataset from EU-SILC. For the other datasets, we obtained permission for using the data from the Department of Health Economics, National School of Public Health (the institution that conducted the cross-sectional surveys in 2006 and 2011).

Authors’ contributions

DZ, AZ and JK contributed to the conception and design of the study. DZ, AZ and IIK contributed to the analysis and the interpretation of the data and drafted the manuscript. JK provided feedback on the manuscript. AZ and JK contributed to the critical revision of the manuscript for important intellectual content. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Ethical approval for the EU-SILC time-series data is not required. Moreover, we obtained ethical approval for the cross-sectional surveys from the Bioethics Committee of the National School of Public Health.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ilias-Ioannis Kyriopoulos.

Rights and permissions

Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Zavras, D., Zavras, A.I., Kyriopoulos, II. et al. Economic crisis, austerity and unmet healthcare needs: the case of Greece. BMC Health Serv Res 16, 309 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-016-1557-5

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-016-1557-5

Keywords