This technical brief ‘Tracking inequalities in financial hardship due to out‑of‑pocket health spending by age structure of a household’, developed by the WHO Centre for Health Development (WKC) and the Health Financing and Economics Department at the World Health Organization, explores the relationship between household age structure and financial hardship caused by out-of-pocket health spending.
Globally, out-of-pocket health expenses can impose significant financial strain on households, with 2 billion people facing catastrophic or impoverishing health costs as of 2019. This burden is especially pronounced in households with older members or multigenerational households. By applying a life-course approach, this brief categorizes households into six distinct types based on their members’ age structure to analyze inequalities in financial hardship. Two key indicators—catastrophic and impoverishing out-of-pocket health spending—are used to assess the impact on these different household types.