Impact of Socio-Economic and Behavioural Factors on the Health Care Expenditure Growth of Middle-East Region

Abstract

Abstract The inexorable rise in health expenditure as a share of GDP over the years has been a source of concern among policy makers. This study provides empirical evidence to the drivers of health expenditure growth in the Middle-East region for the time period of 2004 to 2020. Consequently, the objective of the study is to investigate the major drivers of health expenditure growth among the socio-demographic, economic and health system capacity constructs and how it changes with the subsequent introduction of the behavioural construct as a moderator, inter-alia. Data obtained from the World Development Indicators is analysed using Partial Least Square Structural Equation Model (PLS-SEM). The empirical evidence suggests that the three constructs drive up health expenditure growth in the Middle-East region. Further, the introduction of moderation improves the fitness of the model, though it has no direct statistically significant effect on health expenditure growth. Conversely, the moderation effect is significant through the socio-demographic, economic and health system capacity indicators. Overall, the socio-demographic transition has been the major driving force for the exponential growth in health care expenditure. The findings suggest that combining set of related variables may help in better understanding of the determinants of health care expenditure growth and ultimately offer informed policy advice that will eventually improve health outcomes.