By Bahattin Gonultas
ANKARA
Turkey’s health care expenditure jumped 13.8 percent in 2013, the Turkish Statistical Institute said on Wednesday.
Total costs reached 84.4 billion Turkish Liras ($37.8 billion) last year, TurkStat said, up from 76.2 billion Turkish liras ($34.1 billion) in 2012.
The institute said that health expenditure per capita increased to $583 in 2013 from $548 in 2012.
The proportion of total health expenditure of the country’s GDP was 5.4 percent in last year and 5.2 percent in 2012.
The proportion of household-out-of-pocket health expenditure to total health expenditure increased to 16.8 in last year from 15.8 in 2012.
The proportion of general government health expenditure to total health expenditure was 78.5 percent in last year and 79.2 percent in 2012.
"Both for meeting the changing domestic needs as well as taking advantage of health tourism, private hospitals and health centers have been established all over the country," the country's health ministry said in a statement.
Foreign institutions including Malaysian sovereign fund Khazanah Nasional, Qatar's First Investment Bank, Argus Capital Partners and the World Bank's International Finance Corp have invested in the Turkish health care sector.
The country is building medical facilities with public-private partnerships in which the state will rent city hospitals built and run by the private sector for 25 years.
The biggest share of the 2014 general budget was allocated to the National Education Ministry with $35.6 billion; the Ministry of Health came at second place with $33.5 billion.
The Finance Ministry has estimated budget expenses for the 2014 fiscal year at 436.4 billion Turkish lira ($200 billion), while budget income for 2014 is estimated at 403.2 billion Turkish lira ($184.6 billion); resulting in a budget deficit of 33.3 billion Turkish lira ($15.2 billion).
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