School of Insurance, Central University of Finance and Economics, Beijing, China.
Business and Tourism School, Sichuan Agricultural University, Chengdu, China.
Front Public Health. 2021 Dec 23;9:791817. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2021.791817. eCollection 2021.
Disease is the primary cause of poverty in China. Health insurance is an essential mechanism for managing health risks and addressing the risk of financial loss. Using data from the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) waves from 2010 to 2016, this study develops a random forest method to assess households' vulnerability to poverty and then examines the impact of major illness insurance on vulnerability to poverty by focusing on the rollout period of a major illness insurance scheme. The research also examines the impact of increased major illness insurance coverage on poverty reduction by focusing on the change from low- to high-coverage health insurance. The findings indicate that major illness insurance and improvements in the degree of coverage significantly reduce vulnerability to poverty. In addition, major illness insurance is found to alleviate the vicious cycle of poverty and disease through the mechanism of increasing household income, and its effect has strengthened over time. Compared to other poverty reduction policies, major illness insurance has a greater influence on poverty alleviation.
疾病是中国贫困的首要原因。健康保险是管理健康风险和应对财务损失风险的重要机制。本研究利用中国家庭追踪调查（CFPS）2010 年至 2016 年的数据，采用随机森林方法评估家庭的贫困脆弱性，然后通过关注重大疾病保险计划的实施阶段，考察重大疾病保险对贫困脆弱性的影响。研究还通过关注从低覆盖度医疗保险到高覆盖度医疗保险的变化，考察了提高重大疾病保险覆盖度对减贫的影响。研究结果表明，重大疾病保险和覆盖度的提高显著降低了贫困脆弱性。此外，重大疾病保险通过增加家庭收入的机制缓解了贫困和疾病的恶性循环，并且这种效应随着时间的推移而增强。与其他减贫政策相比，重大疾病保险对减贫的影响更大。
