Statec, Luxembourg’s national statistics office, has published a report detailing the cost to the state of sickness and maternity benefits for 2015.
In 2015, the actual expenditure of the sickness and maternity insurance amounted to €2,475.6 million compared to €2,490.7 million in 2014, representing a decrease of €15.1 million in the absolute cost. €1.66 billion was spent on healthcare costs in Luxembourg and €434 million on healthcare costs abroad.
After a moderate increase in 2013 (+4.0%) and slower growth in 2014 (+0.6%) the expenditure for sickness benefits in 2015 saw an increase of 3.6%. The costs amounted to €131.5 million as opposed to €126.9 million in 2014.
The decrease in nominal value amounted to 0.6%, and there was a real decline of 0.6% based on the cost of living index (base 100). The actual expenditure is obtained by deducting the amount of current expenditures of the levy provisions of €359.8 million.
Administrative costs amounted to €79.9 million in 2015. This amount is broken down into administrative expenses of €78.3 million, a loss provision of €4.2 million (to be addressed in 2016) and a levy to provisions made of €2.6 million in 2014. These provisions concern the administrative fees to be paid to Belgian mutual companies relating to supplements.
Compared to 2014, actual administrative expenses increased by 3.8% (€2.9 million). In particular, personnel costs increased by 4.4% (€2.1 million) in 2015.
It should be noted that the wages and salaries of current staff increased by 2.6% in comparison to 2014 (2014/2013: 2.7%) and also the trend of strong growth of retirees observed during the years 2011 to 2014 (2011: 11.8%; 2012: 13.2%; 2013: 7.2% 2014: 7.1%) is still ongoing. It has increased by 13.9% (€1.0 million in absolute value). It is important to note that the number of pensioners increased by just 16 in 2015.
Following the figures for 2014 and 2015, the number of beneficiaries rose by 4.4%. The average length per beneficiary decreased by 2.7%, while the average gross compensation awarded has increased by 0.8%. Most importantly, the number of beneficiaries below 35 years of age increased less rapidly (+2.3%) than those above 35 years of age (+4.8%). The average duration of cases increased for beneficiaries below 35 years (+ 2.3%) and decreased for those over 35 years (-3.0%).
