Does Rapid and Sustained Economic Growth Lead to Convergence in Health Resources: The Case of China From 1980 to 2010

Liang, Di; Zhang, Donglan; Huang, Jiayan; Schweitzer, Stuart

The absence of constant sigma convergence in process and outcome indicators is probably the result of multiple factors. First, determinants outside the health system could influence the process and outcome indicators differently. Although the outcome indicator, maternal mortality rate, is very sensitive to health services performance, it is also influenced by many social and cultural factors. 24 Second, even if the gap in structure indicators was narrowed, changes in the process and outcome variables would lag and may take years to observe. And last but not least, the data availability has limited our ability to evaluate the convergence in process and outcome measures. It is notable that the absence of constant sigma convergence does not contradict the tested beta convergence, as beta convergence is not a sufficient condition for sigma convergence, which directly reflected the narrowed disparities.