Masters R, et al. J Epidemiol Community Health 2017;0:1–8. doi:10.1136/jech 2016-208141
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ABSTRACT
Background Public sector austerity measures in many
high-income countries mean that public health budgets
are reducing year on year. To help inform the potential
impact of these proposed disinvestments in public
health, we set out to determine the return on investment
(ROI) from a range of existing public health
interventions.
Methods We conducted systematic searches on all
relevant databases (including MEDLINE; EMBASE;
CINAHL; AMED; PubMed, Cochrane and Scopus) to
identify studies that calculated a ROI or cost-benefit ratio
(CBR) for public health interventions in high-income
countries.
Results We identified 2957 titles, and included 52
studies. The median ROI for public health interventions
was 14.3 to 1, and median CBR was 8.3. The median
ROI for all 29 local public health interventions was 4.1
to 1, and median CBR was 10.3. Even larger benefits
were reported in 28 studies analysing nationwide public
health interventions; the median ROI was 27.2, and
median CBR was 17.5.
Conclusions This systematic review suggests that local
and national public health interventions are highly costsaving.
Cuts to public health budgets in high income
countries therefore represent a false economy, and are
likely to generate billions of pounds of additional costs
to health services and the wider economy.