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Background As the aging population continues to grow at an accelerating pace, it is crucial to pay attention to the impact of public medical insurance policies on the health of older adults. Therefore, based on the health status of older adults in China, we aim to evaluate the effectiveness of the implementation of the integrated policy of urban and rural medical insurance in China. Methods Data were obtained from China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS) of 2015and 2018. we use the difference-in-differences model (DID) to investigate the impact of the urban‒rural medical insurance integration policy on the health status of elderly individuals, we further use Propensity score matching method-difference-in-differences (PSM-DID) and individual fixed effect method to conduct robustness checks on the benchmark regression results. Results The results indicate that the urban‒rural medical insurance integration policy effectively improved the health status of elderly individuals. Heterogeneity analysis confirms that the health promotion effect brought about by the urban-rural medical insurance integration policy is more significant among elderly individuals with chronic diseases, higher age and lower education levels. Furthermore, The mechanism test reveals that the implementation of the urban‒rural medical insurance integration policy can effectively improve the medical satisfaction of elderly individuals, which in turn benefits the health of elderly individuals. Conclusion The implementation of the integrated policy of urban and rural medical insurance has a significant positive effect on the health status of older adults, particularly for the vulnerable elderly population. This finding indicates that there is still room for further optimization of the current basic medical insurance policies and the level of medical security in China. |
