Variations according to age and income. According to a geographical study by the Department of Research, Studies, Evaluation and Statistics of the Ministry of Health, the French spent, on average, 2,750 euros per year for treatment in 2018. A figure that is, in detail, more complex with large differences: the evaluation ranging from 2,290 euros in Loire-Atlantique, to 3,550 euros in Haute-Corse.
Once corrected for the age and sex of the population, health expenditure remains higher in the overseas departments, in Corsica, in the northeast metropolitan quarter, and around the Mediterranean, according to the study. “Health expenditure is thus a little higher in those where the poverty rate is the highest,” notes the DREES. “Indeed, the most precarious patients are likely to need more care, even if they are also the most concerned about forgoing care. »
Health spending per capita also tends to be higher in departments “where the standard of living of the wealthiest is the highest”, and in those where the supply of care is more abundant, notes the study. “In some departments around the Mediterranean, the high level of expenditure is linked to a high medical density,” the study notes.
Another factor inflating health spending per capita is the “geographical modulations of regulatory healthcare tariffs” in the overseas departments, Île-de-France and Corsica. These higher prices could “alone […] explain the additional health expenditure observed in the overseas departments”, according to the note.
