10 POPULAR HEALTH ECONOMIC FALLACIES

Important decisions about the financing, determining priorities in and provision of health services depend on beliefs about facts and relati onships. It is argued in this paper that many popular beliefs are eith er logically wrong or are not supported by the evidence. Important err ors exist in the beliefs about the effects of technology and ageing po pulations on health care costs, affordability of care, capital resourc es, financing mechanisms, efficiency and economies of scale, the growt h of litigation, priority setting and the importance of getting people back to work. This paper aims to correct some of these fallacies and suggest alternative beliefs that better match the theory or fit the ev idence.