Prevention Act in Germany: Strengthening Prevention and Health Promotion

Prevention and health promotion measures should be anchored where people live, learn and work: in daycare centres, schools, workplaces and nursing homes.

The Prevention Act: An Opportunity for a healthier Society

The Act to strengthen health promotion and prevention, passed on 18 June 2015, is an important step towards holistic healthcare. It aims to improve cooperation between the various players in the healthcare system and increase the effectiveness of prevention and health promotion [1], [2]. This blog post takes a look at the main objectives and content of this act and discusses how it can help to reduce gender-based inequalities in healthcare.

Objectives of the law:

• Improve cooperation between the healthcare stakeholders
• Better coordination of the actions of the healthcare stakeholders
• Increase the effectiveness of prevention and health promotion
• Financial investment in prevention and health promotion

Main target of the law: health insurance

The Prevention Act is mainly aimed at the health insurance funds and defines various measures to strengthen cooperation and coordination in the healthcare system [2].

Contents of the Law:

• Cooperation: The law strengthens cooperation between the statutory social insurances and private health insurers through common goals and procedures.
• Prevention mandate: There is a specific prevention mandate for social long-term care insurance in order to strengthen health-promoting programmes in residential care homes.
• Health check-ups: It provides for the further development of health and early detection examinations for children, yound people and adults.
• Financial support: The law makes more than 500 million euros available for health-promoting services provided by the health and long-term care insurance funds and increases financial support for health-related self-help by 30 million euros.
• National prevention strategy: It concretises cooperation in health promotion on the basis of a joint national prevention strategy.

Focus on gender inequality:

The Prevention Act also aims to reduce gender-related inequalities in health opportunities. This is anchored in a new paragraph in the German Social Security Code V, which obliges statutory health insurances to take gender-specific characteristics into account within their range of services. [3]

Conclusion:

The Prevention Act offers an opportunity to sustainably improve the healthcare system in Germany and tackle gender-related inequalities. Through better cooperation, financial investment and targeted health promotion, it can help to ensure that all people, regardless of their gender, have equal access to high-quality healthcare.

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Takeaway points:

• Prevention act: improves cooperation and effectiveness of prevention in the healthcare system
• Objective: Equal access to healthcare
• Main addressee: Health insurances
• Contents:
  • Strengthening cooperation between insurance companies
  • Specific prevention mandate for long-term care insurance
  • Further development of health check-ups
  • Financial support for health services and self-help
  • National prevention strategy

For more Information

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