TITLE:
The Impact of Dietary Patterns on Health Expenditure in Rural Hainan of China
AUTHORS:
Wen Yu, Shiwei Xu, Mei Li, Zhemin Li, Yu Wang, Abdul-Gafar Ahmed
KEYWORDS:
Dietary Pattern, Health Expenditure, Seemingly Unrelated Regression (SUR), Suggestion
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Social Sciences,
Vol.4 No.5,
May
31,
2016
ABSTRACT: The dietary
patterns determine the nutrition structure and suitable nutrition benefits for
health. In order to measure the relationship between nutrition and health, this
article focuses on the relationship between Dietary patterns and health
expenditure. We collected 547 household samples from six counties in rural
Hainan Province of China. The authors applied Seemingly Unrelated Regression
(SUR) model to estimate the empirical model. The results are: (1) some animal
food have significant effect to health expenditure; (2) based on the current
analysis, consuming more pork and eggs, health expenditure would significantly
increase; while consuming more chicken and fish, health expenditure would
significantly decrease. We could conclude that appropriate dietary pattern
benefits health; livestock meat consuming, primarily pork, may cause more
health care expenditure, while fish-dominant diet could reduce health
expenditure