The evaluation of health policies using longitudinal data: impacts on Australian policy debate

Description of impact *

Anam Bilgrami's doctoral research with supervisors, Kompal Sinha and Henry Cutler, analysed Australian policies which had either not been evaluated or had a limited evidence base. This research offers direct inputs to policy debate and policy design.
The research on maternal mental health impacts of the Paid Parental Leave and Dad and Partner Pay schemes, published in Health Economics, has an Altmetric Attention Score of 58 (top 5%). The findings were covered prominently by Jessica Irvine (senior economics writer) in the Sydney Morning Herald (front-page print and online). This coverage also appeared in The Brisbane Times, The Age and WAToday. The Sydney Morning Herald has a reach of 10.3 million readers. Brisbane Times, The Age and WAToday have a reach of 1.23 million, 2.87 million and 816,000, respectively. This research was mentioned again in another media article in the Brisbane Times on promoting gender equity in the workforce. Anam was interviewed about the research by Human Resources Director Magazine and invited to write a piece for policymakers about the findings for Health Economics Connect by the Australian Health Economics Society.
Anam's research on private health insurance reforms, published in the Economic Record, is directly contributing to policy debate and future policy design. Henry Cutler and Anam Bilgrami were interviewed in late 2021 regarding their views on current policy settings, as part of the current Australian Government review of private health insurance policy. Anam was invited to write a policy piece on this research by ANU for the Austaxpolicy blog.

Impact date	2020 → 2022
Category of impact	Policy impacts, Health impacts