Health externalities and economic evaluation

Abstract: When the health benefits of an intervention are estimated in an economic evaluation there is an (almost) exclusive focus on the 'patient'. This seems to be at odds with what we know about the impact of health (care) on the family. In this talk, I will discuss the implication of the presence of wider health effects ('health externalities') for economic evaluation. I will address questions such as: do health externalities bias inferences from economic evaluations? Are health externalities likely to be large? Are health externalities likely to vary across conditions and interventions? How might health externalities be addressed (or internalised) in economic evaluations?