IHCO Report 2017. Assessing the worldwide contribution of cooperatives to healthcare.

The International Health Cooperative Organisation (IHCO) and the European Research Institute on Cooperative and Social Enterprises (Euricse) agreed to jointly develop a research initiative on the contribution of healthcare cooperatives to improve people’s health and wellbeing across the world.

The research project presented in this report uses both quantitative and qualitative methods to explore this topic. Statistical data coming from different sources were collected, aggregated and synthesized to provide an overview of the role and features of healthcare cooperatives in 15 countries. Furthermore, six case studies were conducted to allow for a more in-depth analysis of the universe of health cooperatives and their organizational models. Research findings show that the current and potential role of health cooperatives is heavily underestimated, especially by public policies, which tend to either favour shareholder for-profit entities in procurement procedures or use cooperatives in an opportunistic manner for cost-saving purposes. The research confirms the importance of improving knowledge about the real dimension and roles of health cooperatives worldwide. Better knowledge in this area is a necessary condition to assign cooperatives a proper place in healthcare systems.

Read the executive summary: Assessing the worldwide contribution of cooperatives to healthcare.