Which countries have the best healthcare systems?

Do you know if your (future) country of expatriation has an efficient healthcare system? According to the WHO, average global life expectancy is rising steadily, which suggests that the quality of healthcare also tends to increase. However, the rankings of health systems in the world show that only high-income countries are better off. Also, in these nations, healthcare costs often are quite high. Find out which countries have the best health systems.

Europe's best healthcare systems

Every year, the Health Consumer Powerhouse publishes a study about healthcare systems across Europe: the Euro Health Consumer Index (EHCI). This report ranks 35 countries according to the quality of their healthcare systems, based on 48 indicators.

  1. Switzerland

  2. Netherlands

  3. Norway

  4. Denmark

  5. Belgium

  6. Finland

  7. Luxemburg

  8. Sweden

  9. Austria

  10. Iceland

2 rankings of world's best healthcare systems

In its study called Mirror, Mirror 2017- International Comparison Reflects Flaws and Opportunities for Better U.S. Health Care, the Commonwealth Fund assessed the performance of healthcare systems in 11 countries based on 72 indicators. The idea was to find out how efficient healthcare in the United States is. The survey ranked US healthcare clear last…

1. United Kingdom

2. Australia

3. Netherlands

4. New Zealand and Norway

6. Switzerland and Sweden

8. Germany

9. Canada

10. France

11. USA

The Bloomberg annual study, Most Efficient Health Care 2018, ranked no less than 56 countries. Asia is the big winner of these rankings.

  1. Hong Kong

  2. Singapore

  3. Spain

  4. Italy

  5. S. Korea

  6. Israel

  7. Japan

  8. Australia

  9. Taiwan

  10. United Arab Emirates

Ranking world's healthcare systems: what criteria?

To succeed in ranking healthcare systems around the world, surveys use a more or less significant amount of indicators.

  • The EHCI study ranks healthcare systems based on such criteria as patient rights, waiting times for treatment, services provided to patients and prevention.
  • The Commonwealth Fund classifies indicators into 5 groups: quality, access, efficiency, equity and healthy lives. Thus, the survey includes indicators like safety, waiting times, administrative organisation and equal access to healthcare.
  • Bloomberg uses life expectancy, healthcare cost as percentage of GDP and healthcare cost per capita to rank world's healthcare systems.
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