Health above all? The importance of Health in the Israeli public

Background: The current crisis in health services is related to demographic changes and to the rapid development of medical technologies, but also to socio-political and culture factors, such as consumerism and the wide-scale development of health insurance.

Study Question: To examine the importance the Israeli public attributes to health in relation to other fields in life, at the personal as well as at the national policy level.

Methods: A phone survey was conducted with a representative sample of the Israeli adult population (N=1,225). A measure with five dilemmas was used to estimate the relative importance of health in personal life. At the social policy level a question asking to which area interviewees would transfer an extra budget was used.

Results: About one third of the population reported high priority to health matters. At the national level, the public graded health in second place after education but before security, infrastructure, support to the needy and tax reduction. Only in half of the interviewees the prioritizing of health at the personal level matched their response at the national level.

Conclusions: The public's preferences for health don't change significantly along different sectors of the Israeli society. Only gender, population group and education had some influence. This study provide empirical evidence regarding the public's preferences. Information of this kind should be part of the decision making process. We maintain that even if a decision which contradicts the public opinion is made, the public's information can be useful in planning the implementation strategy.