Canadian health expenditures: Where do we really stand internationally?

THERE ARE DIFFERENT WAYS TO MEASURE how much Canada spends on health care a nd the quality of these measurements may vary. This paper examines Organiza tion for Economic Cooperation and Development data for 3 common standards o f measure: health expenditures as a proportion of gross domestic product (G DP), nominal spending per capita (US dollars) and spending per capita in pu rchasing power parities (PPP) equivalents. In 1994, the most recent year fo r which there were firm data, Canada spent 9.9% of its GDP on health care ( rank 3 of 29), and $1999 PPPs per capita (rank 3). However, actual spending was only US$1824 per capita (rank 14). In the same year Japan spent 7% of GDP on health care (rank 22), $1478 in PPPs per capita (rank 16), but actua lly spent US$2614 per capita (rank 3). Although each measure is suitable fo r some policy purposes, Canadian spending remains modest by international s tandards.