TITLE:
Out of Pocket Health Expenditure and Healthcare Subsidy in Jamaica, and Some Selected Countries in North America
AUTHORS:
Olayinka Adeyemi, Wasiu Abayomi
KEYWORDS:
Healthcare Subsidies, Out-of-Pocket Expenditure, Catastrophic Health Spending, Generalized Methods of Moment
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Applied Sciences,
Vol.16 No.4,
April
29,
2026
ABSTRACT: Globally, financing healthcare is characterized by high Out-of-Pocket expenditure (OOPE) for healthcare. This has rendered so many households without health insurance into catastrophic health spending. This study has examined the effects of healthcare subsidies (HS) on OOPE in some selected countries in North America. We have employed advanced econometrics model, such as static fixed effects panel and dynamic system generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator. Our data was sourced from World Bank data base from 2000 to 2022. Our results show that there is a positive correlation between healthcare subsidies and OOPE, implying that HS is not strong enough to provoke reduction in OOPE. We also found an inverse relationship between cardiovascular disease mortality rate and OOPE. This implies that reduction in the mortality rate reduces the amount of OOPE in the region. The results suggest that government should device a better way like co-payment to achieve universal coverage for all its citizens. This would definitely and directly reduce the volume of payment households make on healthcare.