Out-of-pocket payments and community-wide health outcomes: an examination of influenza vaccination subsidies in Japan
Out-of-pocket payments and community-wide health outcomes: an examination of influenza vaccination subsidies in Japan
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自付费用和社区范围内的健康结果：日本流感疫苗接种补贴的审查
DOI：
10.1017/s1744133116000037
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发表时间：
2016
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
Yoko and Shun-ichiro Bessho
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Ibuka;Yoko and Shun-ichiro Bessho
尽管研究表明，疫苗接种自付费用的减少通常会鼓励接种疫苗，但很少有人研究其对健康结果的影响。因此，本研究利用覆盖全国的日本流感疫苗接种补贴计划的市级调查数据，研究了通过补贴计划减少非老年人疫苗接种自付费用如何影响地区流感活动。我们发现，付款减少与该地区流感高度警报的周数呈负相关，尽管相关性因年份而异。与此同时，我们发现付款减少与流感爆发的总持续时间（即中度或高度警报的时期）之间没有显着相关性。鉴于处于高度戒备状态的周数越多，表明疫情越严重，我们的研究结果表明，减少非老年人流感疫苗自付费用对整个社区的健康结果产生了积极影响，表明减少自付费用有助于有效控制严重流感疫情。这表明，如前所述，减少付款不仅可以使个人受益，为他们提供更好的预防性护理，而且可以缩短流行病的持续时间，使整个社区受益。
While studies have shown that reductions in out-of-pocket payments for vaccination generally encourages vaccination uptake, research on the impact on health outcomes has rarely been examined. Thus, the present study, using municipal-level survey data on a subsidy programme for influenza vaccination in Japan that covers the entire country, examines how reductions in out-of-pocket payments for vaccination among non-elderly individuals through a subsidy programme affected regional-level influenza activity. We find that payment reductions are negatively correlated with the number of weeks with a high influenza alert in that region, although the correlation varied across years. At the same time, we find no significant correlation between payment reductions and the total duration of influenza outbreaks (i.e. periods with a moderate or high alert). Given that a greater number of weeks with a high alert indicates a severer epidemic, our findings suggest that reductions in out-of-pocket payments for influenza vaccination among the non-elderly had a positive impact on community-wide health outcomes, indicating that reduced out-of-pocket payments contributes to the effective control of severe influenza epidemics. This suggests that payment reductions could benefit not only individuals by providing them with better access to preventive care, as has been shown previously, but also communities as a whole by shortening the duration of epidemics.