Hospital-bed statistics show how inpatient capacity differs across health systems, but the figures are only comparable when their measurement period, geography, and bed definition are clear. The data below covers global benchmarks, OECD indicators, selected-country comparisons, and European Union hospital and long-term-care measures from 2013 through 2024.
Table of contents
- Global hospital-bed density benchmarks
- OECD supply, occupancy, and intensive care
- Hospital beds per 1,000 people in selected countries
- EU hospital-bed totals and national rates
- Hospital beds by function and type of care
- EU trends and long-term-care capacity
Global hospital-bed density benchmarks
The World Health Organization reported a global average of 27 hospital beds per 10,000 population in 2020 or the latest available year. The corresponding average for the WHO African Region was 12.69 beds per 10,000 population. These are regional and global density measures, not counts of beds in a particular country.
WHO’s Service Availability and Readiness Assessment (SARA) benchmarks cited in 2022 provide context for those figures. The benchmark for lower-middle-income countries was 18 beds per 10,000 population, while the benchmark for upper-middle-income countries was 39 beds per 10,000. WHO identified a density below 18 beds per 10,000 as a level that can indicate serious constraints on inpatient access.
The same WHO comparison reported an observed minimum of 20 hospital beds per 10,000 among the OECD members used for comparison, based on 2015 OECD data. The 18-bed threshold corresponds approximately to an inpatient hospital admission rate of 5% of the population per year. This is a benchmark relationship, not a claim that every health system with that density has the same admission rate.
Source: World Health Statistics 2022
OECD supply, occupancy, and intensive care
OECD countries averaged 4.3 hospital beds per 1,000 population in 2021. More than half of OECD countries reported between 3 and 8 beds per 1,000 population in that year. Korea reported 12.8 beds per 1,000, and Japan reported 12.6, placing both well above the OECD average in the cited comparison.
Bed supply also changed over the 2011–2021 period. Finland recorded the largest OECD decrease in beds per capita, at about 50%. Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Norway, and the Netherlands each reduced hospital capacity by at least 1 bed per 1,000 population since 2011. These figures describe capacity per population; they do not by themselves measure whether access, staffing, or clinical demand improved or worsened.
Occupancy provides a different view of capacity. The average OECD occupancy rate for curative acute-care beds was 69.8% in 2021. OECD countries averaged 16.9 adult intensive-care beds per 100,000 population in the same year. A system can therefore have a comparatively high total-bed density while having a different intensive-care mix or a different share of beds occupied.
Source: Hospital beds and occupancy: Health at a Glance 2023
Hospital beds per 1,000 people in selected countries
The OECD comparison below uses 2019 or the nearest available year. It should not be directly merged with the OECD 2021 average above, because the periods and source presentation differ.
| Country or comparison | Hospital beds per 1,000 population |
|---|---|
| Japan | 12.8 |
| Korea | 12.4 |
| Russia | 8.0 |
| Germany | 7.9 |
| Austria | 7.2 |
| Hungary | 6.9 |
| Czech Republic | 6.6 |
| Lithuania | 6.4 |
| Poland | 6.2 |
| France | 5.8 |
| Slovak Republic | 5.8 |
| Belgium | 5.6 |
| Latvia | 5.4 |
| China | 4.8 |
| Switzerland | 4.6 |
| Estonia | 4.5 |
| Slovenia | 4.4 |
| OECD38 average | 4.4 |
| Luxembourg | 4.3 |
| Greece | 4.2 |
Japan’s 12.8 beds per 1,000 and Korea’s 12.4 were the highest country values in this selected list. Russia and Germany followed at 8.0 and 7.9. At the lower end of the listed country figures, Greece reported 4.2 beds per 1,000, Luxembourg 4.3, and Slovenia 4.4; the OECD38 average was 4.4.
The table is a density comparison rather than a ranking of health-system performance. Hospital-bed definitions, care mixes, utilization, and the availability of alternative care can affect how much inpatient capacity a given density represents.
Source: OECD Reviews of Health Systems: Brazil 2021 (EN)
EU hospital-bed totals and national rates
Eurostat reported 2,282,938 available hospital beds across the European Union in 2024, equal to 507.4 available beds per 100,000 inhabitants. The total and rate describe available hospital beds, a measure that is distinct from occupancy and from the number of beds assigned to a particular clinical function.
Selected 2024 national figures illustrate why totals and population-adjusted rates should be read together. France had 367,128 available hospital beds, while Italy had 183,789 and Spain had 138,549. Belgium had 63,544 available beds, Bulgaria 56,061, Greece 43,908, and Croatia 21,594.
Among the rates supplied for the same period, Bulgaria had 870.3 available beds per 100,000 inhabitants, Greece had 423.3, and Spain had 283.5. A large national total does not necessarily mean the highest rate, because population size changes the denominator.
| 2024 EU measure | Value |
|---|---|
| EU available hospital beds | 2,282,938 |
| EU available beds per 100,000 inhabitants | 507.4 |
| Bulgaria available beds per 100,000 | 870.3 |
| Greece available beds per 100,000 | 423.3 |
| Spain available beds per 100,000 | 283.5 |
Source: Hospital beds by function and type of care, 2024
Hospital beds by function and type of care
Available beds are not a single clinical category. In 2024, Belgium had 56,816 curative-care beds and 16,553 psychiatric-care beds. Italy had 150,492 curative-care beds. France had 101,271 rehabilitative-care beds, while Bulgaria had 7,144 rehabilitative-care beds. Spain had 20,114 long-term-care beds within hospitals.
Population-adjusted functional measures also differed. Belgium had 479.5 curative-care beds per 100,000 inhabitants, while Bulgaria had 724.6 curative-care beds per 100,000. These values concern curative-care beds, so they should not be treated as interchangeable with each country’s total available hospital-bed count.
The functional breakdown helps explain why a total-bed comparison can be incomplete. Two countries may report similar totals but have different allocations across curative, rehabilitative, psychiatric, and long-term care. It also helps separate hospital capacity from long-term-care provision outside hospitals, which Eurostat reports as a distinct measure in the trend data.
Source: Hospital beds by function and type of care, 2024
EU trends and long-term-care capacity
Eurostat reported 511 hospital beds per 100,000 people in the EU in 2023, compared with 517 in 2022 and 552 in 2013. The figures show a lower EU average in 2023 than in the two earlier comparison points, although the supplied figures do not explain the causes of the change.
National 2023 hospital-bed rates varied widely. Bulgaria had 864 hospital beds per 100,000 people, the highest EU ratio reported for that year. Sweden had 187, the Netherlands 231, and Denmark 233. These measures are rates per population, not national bed totals.
Long-term-care capacity can move in a different direction from hospital capacity. In 2023, the Netherlands had 1,400 long-term-care beds per 100,000 people in nursing and residential care facilities, and Sweden had 1,315. Greece had 20 long-term-care beds per 100,000 in those facilities. The comparison uses nursing and residential care facilities, not hospital beds, so it should not be added to the hospital-bed rate as though it were the same category.
| EU measure | Period | Value |
|---|---|---|
| EU hospital beds per 100,000 people | 2013 | 552 |
| EU hospital beds per 100,000 people | 2022 | 517 |
| EU hospital beds per 100,000 people | 2023 | 511 |
| Bulgaria hospital beds per 100,000 people | 2023 | 864 |
| Sweden hospital beds per 100,000 people | 2023 | 187 |
| Netherlands long-term-care beds per 100,000 | 2023 | 1,400 |
| Sweden long-term-care beds per 100,000 | 2023 | 1,315 |
| Greece long-term-care beds per 100,000 | 2023 | 20 |