Life expectancy in Romania is among the lowest in Europe, and the COVID-19 pandemic reversed some of the gains made since 2000, according to the latest “State of Health in the EU- Romania Country Health Profile 2021” study conducted by the European Commission.
The pandemic has highlighted the importance of strengthening primary care, preventive services and public health, in a health system currently heavily reliant on inpatient care. Health workforce shortages and high out-of-pocket spending are key barriers to access. The COVID-19 pandemic stimulated the creation of several electronic information systems to manage overstretched health resources better, and these may offer avenues to future health system strengthening.
In terms of Health Status, the report notes that life expectancy in Romania increased by more than four years between 2000 and 2019, but declined temporarily by 1.4 years in 2020 due to the impact of COVID-19. There is a marked gender gap, with women living almost eight years longer than men. Cardiovascular diseases are the leading causes of mortality while lung cancer is the most frequent cause of cancer death.
As for the Romanians’ risk factors, the study shows that risky health behaviours contribute to nearly half of all deaths. Romanians
report higher alcohol consumption and unhealthier diets than the EU averages, but adult obesity is the lowest in the EU. Smoking in adults is now marginally lower than the EU average. These risk factors are more prevalent among men than women. Overweight, obesity and smoking rates among adolescents are high, and have been growing steadily over the past two decades.
Almost half of all deaths in Romania in 2019 can be attributed to behavioural risk factors, including tobacco smoking, unhealthy diet, alcohol
consumption and low physical activity. Environmental factors such as air pollution also contribute to a considerable number of deaths. Unhealthy diets, including low fruit and vegetable intake, and high sugar and salt consumption, were implicated in a quarter of all deaths in 2019. Tobacco consumption (including second-hand smoking) contributed to an estimated 17 % of all deaths, while around 7 % were
attributable to alcohol consumption, and 2 % to low levels of physical activity.
Air pollution, in the form of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and ozone exposure alone contributed an estimated 7 % of all deaths in 2019 (over 17 000 deaths) – a much higher proportion than on average across EU countries (4 %). In most cases, air pollution contributes to deaths from cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, and some types of cancer.
The EC report also points out that health spending in Romania increased in the last decade but remains the second lowest in the EU as a whole – both as a share of GDP and per capita.
About 44 % of health spending was allocated to inpatient care in 2019, which is the highest proportion among EU countries. Although the public share of health spending is high and in line with the EU average, out-of-pocket payments are above the EU average and are dominated by outpatient pharmaceutical costs.
In Romania the life expectancy has dropped by an average of 1.4 years, which means double than the European average of 0.7 years.
The study also shows that risk factors are more common in men than in women, and this can be seen in life expectancy. Women live almost eight years longer than men, being one of the biggest gaps in Europe. However, Romania is at the bottom of the ranking.
The European countries with the highest life expectancy are Norway (83.3 years), and Iceland (83.1 years), while Romania (74.2 years) and Bulgaria (73.6 years) are at the bottom of the ranking. .
Read the full report here.
There is not a lot to do in Romania except drink alcohol.