Written question asked by Lord Lansley (Conservative) on Tuesday, 22 February 2005, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Tuesday, 1 March 2005. It was answered by Lord Boateng (Labour) on Tuesday, 1 March 2005 on behalf of the Treasury.

Treasury

Question: To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what percentage of the UK's GDP was spent on health in each year since 1997, broken down by (a) public and (b) private expenditure; and what estimate he has made of the current EU average health expenditure as a proportion of GDP. - Inc table.

Answer: Mr. Lansley: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what percentage of the UK's GDP was spent on health in each year since 1997, broken down by (a) public and (b) private expenditure; and what estimate he has made of the current EU average health expenditure as a proportion of GDP. [218125] Mr. Boateng: The information about UK health spending is in the following table. According to the latest figures from the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), average total health expenditure in the EU in 2002 was 8.5 per cent. of GDP. UK Health expenditure as a percentage of GDP _________________________________________________________________________________________________. 1997-98 1998-99 1999-2000 2000-01 2001-02 2002-03 2003-04 2004-05 Public Expenditure 5.4 5.4 5.4 5.6 6.0 6.3 6.7 6.9 Private expenditure 1.3 1.4 1.4 1.4 1.3 1.4 1.4 1.4 Total UK expenditure 6.7 6.8 6.8 7.0 7.3 7.7 8.1 8.3 _________________________________________________________________________________________________. Notes: 1. The public expenditure figures are taken from the National Statistics release of 2 December 2004. 2. Private spending is calculated in a similar way as for ONS Health Accounts. From 2003-04, it is assumed to carry forward as a constant share of GDP. 3. The EU figure is a simple average of the then 15 EU countries; it is not weighted by country population.

Secondary information