The Impact of Austerity on the Portuguese National Health Service, Citizens’ Well-Being, and Health Inequalities

Hespanha, Pedro

doi:10.4000/eces.4187

Cited by 6 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Since 2010, Portugal has witnessed to a twofold reduction in public health expenses, namely in personnel (between 2010 and 2012, this was reduced by 27%) and in capital expenses (a reduction of 81%) between 2010 and 2014 (Hespanha 2019). The share of out-of-pocket payments is the second largest source of revenue for health care spending (28%), well above the EU average (15%) (OECD and European Observatory 2017: 7).…”

Section: Portugal and Its National Health Servicementioning

confidence: 99%

The Unlikely Saviour: Portugal’s National Health System and the Initial Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic?

2020

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What is the impact of COVID-19 on Portugal’s Serviço Nacional de Saúde (SNS), the country’s national health service? The story, still unfolding, has all the elements of a recipe for disaster: one of the most elderly populations in the world; a weakened SNS, the result of a litany of policies and interventions by the ‘Troika’ (the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund); a health care delivery system focused on non-communicable diseases and long-term care; the growing public distrust in public services, compared to private, hotel-like health care facilities. We are aware that these are still the early days of the epidemic, yet it is safe to say that algorithmic scenarios of doom and gloom have so far been averted. In the past six months of the pandemic, the level of trust of the Portuguese population in the SNS and its health personnel has significantly improved, while the government has started to provide additional funding and to work for the expansion of the public system. At the very inception of the pandemic, private hospitals practically closed their doors to COVID-19 patients. Unexpectedly a new disease, COVID-19, by definition the foe of any health system, has granted the opportunity for a rare consensus amongst different key political and/or corporate actors in a long-called-for reform of the SNS. Social science and humanities, with their analytical tools and theoretical-conceptual frameworks, are mandatory in providing well-funded answers to such riddles and better grasping the reasons for the twist and turns.

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Section: Portugal and Its National Health Servicementioning

confidence: 99%

The Unlikely Saviour: Portugal’s National Health System and the Initial Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic?

2020

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“…This shows that vaccine resistance clusters open space for disease susceptibility [14]. In a similar way to other Southern European countries, Portugal has been subjected in the last decades to a radical neoliberalization of health care because of two major international financial crises [15]. The neoliberalization of health care has been described in the literature vis-à-vis healthism.…”

Section: The Contextmentioning

confidence: 72%

Healthism vis-à-vis Vaccine Hesitancy: Insights from Parents Who Either Delay or Refuse Children’s Vaccination in Portugal

Mendonça

Hilário

2023

Societies

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Although healthism appears to be at the heart of the decision-making process of vaccine hesitancy, this matter has been understudied. We believe that the concept of healthism may be key to lessen the polarization of discourses around vaccination, offering a broad understanding of parents’ decision to not vaccinate their children. This article aims to deepen the knowledge on the relation between healthism and vaccine hesitancy, using Portugal as a case study. A qualitative research approach was adopted, and therefore, in-depth interviews were conducted with 31 vaccine-hesitant parents. The findings showed that vaccine-hesitant parents usually adopt several strategies based on natural living to prevent and tackle their children’s potential health issues. There appears to be a common approach towards health and life (i.e., healthism) among vaccine-hesitant parents. Drawing upon the healthism ideology, vaccine-hesitant parents make choices to ensure the good health of their child. These choices nevertheless represent a privileged position as the pursuit of healthfulness is constrained by sociodemographic aspects. Using vaccine hesitancy as the starting point, our findings show that healthism and its focus on personal accountability under the umbrella of neoliberalism may jeopardize global public health. Healthcare professionals should pay particular attention to healthism when addressing vaccine hesitancy in Portugal and elsewhere. Research evidence advocates the need to be sensitive to the broad spectrum of vaccine hesitancy as this encompasses multiple views on the subject.

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“…Although the Portuguese National Health Service provides all services (except dental care) to the entire population, inequalities in accessing healthcare in Portugal are well-documented [41][42][43][44][45][46][47]. The economic crisis and subsequent implementation of austerity measures in 2010 had a negative impact on the Portuguese National Health System and made it more difficult to access healthcare [41,44,48,49]. Nevertheless, in the last decade, Portuguese civil society and policymakers have made great efforts to support informal caregivers.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Longitudinal Association between Co-Residential Care Provision and Healthcare Use among the Portuguese Population Aged 50 and Over: A SHARE Study

Barbosa

Dias

Voss

et al. 2023

IJERPH

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Co-residential care is associated with poor caregiver health and a high burden. Although Portugal relies heavily on co-residential care by individuals aged 50 and over, studies on the impact of co-residential care provision on Portuguese caregivers’ healthcare use are lacking. This study aims to analyze the impact of co-residential care (spousal and non-spousal care) on healthcare use of the Portuguese population aged 50 plus. Data from waves 4 (n = 1697) and 6 (n = 1460) of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) were used. Negative Binomial Generalized Linear Mixed Models with random (individual level) and fixed (covariates) effects were performed. The results show that the number of visits to the doctor decrease significantly over time for the co-residential spousal caregivers as compared to the non-co-residential caregivers. This result highlights the fact that the Portuguese co-residential spousal caregiver group is at a higher risk of not using healthcare, thus jeopardizing their own health and continuity of care. Promoting more accessible healthcare services and implementing public policies adjusted to the needs of informal caregivers are important to improve the health and healthcare use of Portuguese spousal co-residential caregivers.

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The Impact of Austerity on the Portuguese National Health Service, Citizens’ Well-Being, and Health Inequalities

Cited by 6 publications

References 11 publications

The Unlikely Saviour: Portugal’s National Health System and the Initial Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic?

The Unlikely Saviour: Portugal’s National Health System and the Initial Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic?

Healthism vis-à-vis Vaccine Hesitancy: Insights from Parents Who Either Delay or Refuse Children’s Vaccination in Portugal

The Longitudinal Association between Co-Residential Care Provision and Healthcare Use among the Portuguese Population Aged 50 and Over: A SHARE Study

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