Ensuring equity in healthcare delivery

Abstract

Abstract Over the past 20 years, the development of health care services and the availability of health care coverage to the population have been accompanied by major gains in life expectancy. There remains, however, an issue in equity of access to health care services which may increase with the economic downturn. Evidence of health inequities can be found in health statistics all around Europe, where low income groups are less healthy and report more limitation to use of healthcare services than higher income groups. There is a strong commitment among researchers in health services to put health inequities on the political and research agendas. This is done by providing tools that assess the effect of new technologies on equity and by ensuring that dashboard indicators include measures of equity.