Analysis of household expenditure on healthcare in Argentina, as a component of universal health coverage.

The 2010 World Health Report of WHO established a conceptual framework for the analysis of the components of Universal Health Coverage; three dimensions were suggested: services coverage, financial coverage, and population coverage. Within this framework, health-related spending of argentine households for the year 2012-2013 are analyzed. The analysis was performed on data retrieved from the National Survey of Household Expenditure 2012-2013. Household healthcare expenditure indicators were built following Sherri's proposal (2012) and multivariate models were defined to identify determiners of household spending. Results indicate that catastrophic spending situations affect 2.3% of the country households, whereas impoverishment resulting from spending on healthcare was detected in 1.7% of them.