Health Facts July 2001

• From 1991/92 to 1998/99 real per capita public expenditure has steadily risen by an average $35 a year from $1290 to $1530 (19th in the OECD). The percentage of publicly funded health expenditure dropped from a peak of 88%of total health expenditure in 1980 to around 80% early in the 1990s.This is fairly close to what it was from 1950 to 1975.
  
• The proportion of the New Zealand population aged over 65 years is expected to rise dramatically over the next 50 years, from 12%to 26%. Increased funding will be required to provide the same level of service in the future.
  
• The total expenditure for DSS in 1999/2000 was $1,554 million. From 1996/97 to 1999/2000 DSS expenditure has grown by 6.1%per year.

• Hospitals are treating more patients than they have in the past. Even after adjusting for changes in the age and gender structure of the population there has been an increase in the number of discharges.
  
• From 1991/92 to 1999/2000 the raw number of daypatients has risen 120%,while the number of inpatients has increased by 37%. From 1988/89 to 1999/2000 the average length of stay of patients decreased from 6.5 days to 3.1 days.
  
• GPs were the most widely used of all the health professionals covered in the 1996/97 New Zealand Health Survey, being visited at least once in the past year by four out of five people.

• New Zealand ’s life expectancy at birth is 74.3 years for males (ranked 13th in the OECD)and 79.6 years for females (ranked 18th).
  
• People living in more deprived areas (as measured by the NZDep96 index) have a lower life expectancy, with the difference between people living in the most deprived areas and the least deprived areas being 6.7 years for females and 9.2 years for males.
  
• Disparities of life expectancy at birth between Mäori and non-Mäori have decreased from about 15 years in 1950-52 to 5 years in 1990-92.

• Since 1960 New Zealand ’s perinatal and infant mortality rates have dramatically decreased. The infant mortality rate has dropped from 22.6 (1960) to 5.7 (1998) deaths per 1,000 live births. The perinatal mortality rate (OECD definition)has dropped from 27.0 (1960)to 6.6 (1996) deaths per 1,000 live births.
  
• The ratio of independent life expectancy to life expectancy of Mäori is lower than that of non-Mäori; therefore they can expect to spend a greater proportion of their life in dependency. This is more accentuated for females than males.

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