A new book claims government-induced austerity programs are causing a heavy spike in health costs and related deaths in Europe and the United States.

For their book, "The Body Economic: Why Austerity Kills," economist David Stuckler and physician Sanjay Basu sifted through data from current fiscal-meltdown years back to the Great Depression and find that austerity is bad for health, while stimulus programs actually promote good health.

According to the authors, there is evidence that escalating health crises, such as higher suicide rates and rising HIV infections, are characteristic of societies that impose economic austerity measures on their citizens.

Editor's Note: Economist Warns: ‘Money From Heaven a Path to Hell.’ See Evidence.

"Can we afford to pay for social protection programs — for healthcare, mental health programs, food stamps and housing programs — when we face a large national debt?" the authors ask in the forward to the book.

"The results of our research demonstrate that stimulus spending on specific health programs actually helps to reduce debt by sparking new economic growth. Every $1 invested in these programs returns $3 back in economic growth that can be used to pay off debt."

Stuckler and Basu say their data show that Iceland, which maintained and even bolstered its social welfare programs during the Great Recession, experienced no rise in deaths during that period.

By contrast, Greece, whose European and international creditors have imposed draconian government spending cuts nearly across the board on its spendthrift ways, has seen a big increase in death rates.

Specifically, the authors write, "The human costs have become dramatically clear: a 52 percent rise in HIV, a doubling in suicide, rising homicides and the return of malaria — all as critical health programs were cut."

The Guardian predicts that politicians demanding that the U.K.'s coalition government dial back its current austerity push will seize on this research.

In the United States, "The effects of proceeding down the current path (of austerity) could be devastating. Without more growth, millions of people will suffer and unemployment will remain high," New Republic reports in an article on the book.

The Irish Examiner notes the book shows negative public health effects are not inevitable during economic downturns. But rather, the book finds that financial crises can be prevented from leading to health epidemics if governments respond effectively.

In their foreward, Stuckler and Basu conclude, "The price of austerity is calculated in human lives. And the lives lost won't return when the stock market bounces back."

Editor's Note: Economist Warns: ‘Money From Heaven a Path to Hell.’ See Evidence.