Evaluations of the health-related impacts of economic recessions show inconsistent results. While they are known to have negative effects on mental health and lead to an increase in suicides, it has been proven that they reduce mortality rates. Recessions also vary in their depth and length, which is likely to influence their impact on health-related problems.
Substantial country-level research in particular has shown that mortality rates decline when the economy weakens (i.e. people in the affected area seem to live slightly longer during recessions). Studies demonstrate that an increase of one percentage point in the unemployment rate decreases mortality rates by varied amounts, from 0.07% in France to 1.4% in Pacific-Asian countries (including Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, and Thailand).
A general health policy agenda in relation to recessions remains ambiguous due to the lack of consistency between different individual- and country-level approaches. However, aggregate regional patterns provide valuable information, and local social planners could use them to design region-specific policy responses to mitigate the negative health effects cause by recessions.
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Read Nick Drydakis' article The relationship between recessions and health.
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