Current expenditure on healthcare in Ireland 2011 to 2021

In 2021, current health expenditure in Ireland amounted to 28.6 billion euros. This figure has generally increased since 2011 when expenditure on health was 18.3 billion euros. When broken down by function, most of the spending in 2018 was taken up by the 12.54 billion euros spent on curative and rehabilitative care. An additional 4.82 billion euros was spent on long term healthcare and 3.1 billion euros on medical goods.

Health expenditure in Ireland compared to Europe 

In comparison to other European countries, Ireland ranked low in terms of health spending as a share of GDP at 6.8 percent in 2019. Top of the list was Switzerland, which spent 12.1 percent of its’ GDP on healthcare. While Germany and France both spent over eleven percent on health. Ireland’s closest neighbor in Europe, the United Kingdom, spent 10.3 percent of its GDP on health. 

Employees in the healthcare sector

In 2019, there were almost 69.4 thousand individuals employed in Irish hospitals, this figure has increased by over 23 thousand since the year 2000. While over the last two decades, the number of general practitioners in Ireland has more than doubled to 4.1 thousand in 2019.