EVALUATION OF OECD COUNTRIES IN TERMS OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDEX, MORTALITY RATES AND HEALTH EXPENDITURES WITH CLUSTER ANALYSIS

The objective of this study is to apply cluster analysis to OECD countries in order to identify country groups with similar Human Development Index (HDI), mortality and health expenditure profiles. In order to achieve the aforementioned aim, the research employed a correlation analysis and K-means clustering method to analyse a number of variables for 38 OECD Countries with 2020 data. These included the HDI, maternal, infant and under-five child mortality rates, the share of total health expenditure and the share of public health expenditure. The results demonstrated a significant and positive correlation between HDI and total health expenditure, as well as public health expenditure. Additionally, a negative and strong relationship was observed between HDI and maternal, infant and child mortality rates. The cluster analysis yielded the following results: 13 countries were assigned to cluster 1, 3 to cluster 2, and 13 to cluster 3. Furthermore, it was observed that Colombia, Mexico and Turkey, which are situated within the same cluster, exhibited the lowest HDI and the lowest proportion allocated to health expenditures with the highest maternal, infant and under-five child mortality rates. The results of this study demonstrate that health expenditure is a crucial factor in the progression of the HDI. It is thought that countries with a low HDI can enhance health outcomes by reducing mortality rates and increasing health expenditure.