On the measurement of the nation's equity adjusted health

The aim of this article is to show a method for measuring the nation's equity-adjusted health. In order to estimate what the 'nation's health function' looks like, data from a survey sent to a sample of Swedish politicians were used. The results from the survey can be interpreted as a measure of inequity aversion, and this was applied to data on healthy years (HY) for males in different social groups for the period 1975-1990. The mean of healthy years increased during the period 1986-1990 by 1.09% while equity adjusted healthy years (HY(EDE)) dropped by -1.78%. The nation's health has decreased in spite of the fact that the individual's health has increased.