Global Health Spending

health
How much does Canada spend on health?
Author

Cole Baril

Published

April 21, 2026

Load Packages

require(pacman)
p_load(tidytuesdayR, tidyverse, trashpanda, magick, rnaturalearth, sf, hexbin)

options(scipen = 999)

Load Data

tuesdata <- tidytuesdayR::tt_load('2026-04-21')
financing_schemes <- tuesdata$financing_schemes
health_spending <- tuesdata$health_spending
spending_purpose <- tuesdata$spending_purpose

Plot

df <- spending_purpose |> 
  filter(country_name == "Canada",
         unit == "constant 2023 US$")


plot <- df |> 
  ggplot() +
  geom_col(aes(x = year, y = value, group = spending_purpose, fill = spending_purpose), position = position_stack()) +
  scale_y_continuous(labels = scales::unit_format(unit = "B", scale = 1e-9), 
                     breaks = c(0, 
                                50000000000, 
                                100000000000, 
                                150000000000, 
                                200000000000)) +
  scale_fill_viridis_d("Spending Purpose") +
  theme_cole(remove_grid = TRUE, base_size = 20) +
  labs(x = "Year", y = "Amount Spent (USD)",
       title = "Annual Health Spending in Canada, WHO Global Health Expenditure Database") +
  theme(plot.title = element_text(hjust = 0))




# Save and display images
current_dir <- dirname(knitr::current_input())
plot_name <- "canada_health_spending.png"

ggsave(plot = plot, 
       dpi = "screen",
       width = 16,
       height = 10,
       device = ragg::agg_png,
       filename = file.path(current_dir, plot_name))


# Read the big plot
img <- image_read(file.path(current_dir, plot_name))

# Force 16:9 aspect ratio with minimal padding
# Target size: 1200x675 px (16:9)
img_card <- image_scale(img, "1200x675")           # scale to fit inside 16:9
img_card <- image_extent(
  img_card,
  geometry = "1200x675",
  gravity = "center"
)

# Save as card preview
image_write(img_card, path = file.path(current_dir, "preview.png"))

knitr::include_graphics(
  file.path(current_dir, plot_name)
)

References

cite_packages(format = "rmd")

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