HQ Team
November 1, 2024: The EU faces a new set of healthcare challenges potentially more potent than the Covid-19 pandemic, and some states are “miles away” from ensuring efficient preventive environments, according to a report from the independent Globsec.
“Though the last major wave of the pandemic receded still only relatively recently, the EU is already facing another set of significant healthcare challenges,” according to the think tank’s ‘Healthcare Readiness Index 2023.’
“Most of these are not as acute as Covid-19 and are likely to ebb and flow with time. As such, these issues are not likely to cause as much media and policy attention even as they afflict populations, some potentially more than the pandemic.”
“This is a potentially great threat.”
The European Union member states have initiated steps during and after the pandemic, increased spending and tried to improve the quality and flexibility of health systems.
Life expectancy declines
“Most member states are still miles away from ensuring sustainable and efficient healthcare environments,” it stated.
The Covid-19 pandemic is an infectious disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus. It killed at least seven million people globally.
According to the World Health Organization the pandemic wiped out nearly a decade of progress in improving life expectancy within just two years.
Between 2019 and 2021, global life expectancy dropped by 1.8 years to 71.4 years — the same as in 2012. Similarly, global healthy life expectancy dropped by 1.5 years to 61.9 years in 2021 — back to the level of 2012.
According to Globsec, during the pandemic, a shortfall in health services provisions and capacity overloads caused by a surge in demand contributed to hundreds of thousands of excess deaths throughout the 2020 -2022 period. The economic output of all EU member states declined.
The Covid-19 pandemic also proved the saying “a chain is as strong as its weakest link” and holds true in the healthcare sector. Unfortunately, “the strength of the chain” proved to be very different across EU countries.
Central and Eastern Europe
Out of the 10 countries at the bottom of the EU’s healthcare performance during the pandemic, eight came from the Central and Eastern Europe region.
“We set out to remind all countries that although the pandemic is over, other major public health issues will eventually emerge, and we cannot afford to “slip up,” Globsec stated.
“We need to continue building resilient healthcare systems, based on evidence, sharing best practices and cooperation across member states. For this reason, we created in 2022 The Healthcare Readiness Index, which aims to provide a holistic overview of the preparedness of members state’s healthcare systems as a simple composite index presented as a ranking.”
The composite index serves as a crucial tool for stakeholders. It facilitates straightforward country comparisons, identifies best practices, and tracks progress over specific periods.
As of readiness for a pandemic, Norway topped with Austria and Germany following. At the bottom of the table were Romania, Hungary and Slovakia.
Bulgaria
The top of readiness for tomorrow’s section was occupied by the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden, closely followed by Denmark and Germany. At the bottom was Bulgaria.
Countries that invest heavily in preventive measures, such as vaccination programs, public health campaigns, and regular screenings, tend to perform better in both current and future readiness.
Preventive care reduces the burden of chronic diseases and prepares healthcare systems to handle emerging health threats more effectively.
Nations lagging in this area need to prioritise public health initiatives to improve their overall readiness. Broader social and environmental factors significantly impact a country’s health readiness, Globsec stated.
The countries that address these determinants, including environmental health risks, tend to score higher in future readiness.
“These factors are increasingly recognised as critical components of a resilient healthcare system that can adapt to and mitigate future health challenges.”
