Regional disparities in the public health care system: Evidence from Romania

Abstract

Abstract The European Pillar of Social Rights proclaimed the people’s right to access to healthcare facilities and services, irrespective of the geographic residence. Currently, the health system in Romania has a number of major deficiencies, ranging from the lack of state-of-the-art equipment in some hospitals, inadequate medical staff in many hospital units, to the lack of essential, vital medicines needed for treatments prescribed to the sick. The paper aims to analyze the differences in the public health care system between the eight development regions in Romania (Northwest, Center, North-East, South-East, South-Muntenia, Bucharest-Ilfov, South-West Oltenia and West) and to identify the reasons that led to their appearance. The paper presents a detailed examination of the main statistical indicators of the public health care system in Romania using a series of statistical analysis techniques. We founded significant differences amongst the eight development regions in Romania, regarding the functioning of the public health care system. Some regions (such as Bucharest Ilfov) is found to outperform others; these regional gaps are analyzed attempting to highlight the main reasons of the regional disparities.