UBC Faculty Research and Publications

Heterogeneous Impacts of Basic Social Health Insurance on Medical Expenditure : Evidence from China’s New Cooperative Medical Scheme Fang, Conglong; He, Chaofei; Rozelle, Scott; Shi, Qinghua; Sun, Jiayin; Yu, Ning

Abstract

This paper examines the effects of China’s New Cooperative Medical Scheme (NCMS) on medical expenditure. Utilizing the quasi-random rollout of the NCMS for a difference-in-difference analysis, we find that the NCMS increased medical expenditure by 12.3%. Most significantly, the good-health group witnessed a 22.1% rise in medical expenditure, and the high-income group saw a rise of 20.6%. The effects, however, were not significant among the poor-health or low-income groups. The findings are suggestive of the need for more help for the very poor and less healthy.

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CC BY 4.0