With the growing push for universal health coverage worldwide, health policy and systems research or HPSR has been the focus of intense global interest in recent years. HPSR not only enhances program design and implementation, but also understanding of how to target investments and remove bottlenecks. In response to the interest, the First Global Symposium […]
A new brief from the HFG Project, “Follow the Money: Making the Most of Limited Health Resources,” explains the importance of resource tracking in financing a country’s health sector, with a focus on Health Accounts. Health Accounts measure the “financial pulse” of national health systems by examining the total health spending in a country – including public, private, household, and […]
In the Philippines, there are roughly 290,000 new TB cases per year (WHO, 2016). Meanwhile, donor funding for TB has declined, health care costs are rising, and out-of-pocket spending accounts for roughly two-thirds of national TB expenditures. The Philippines needs to identify mechanisms to improve the efficiency of TB spending (i.e., mechanisms for spending money […]
Delivering RBF payments via mobile money can expose recipients to the process and value of mobile money and potentially stimulate demand for additional mobile money services within the broader community and particularly within the health sector. This paper explores opportunities and barriers and makes recommendations for a small-scale pilot to test mobile money in the […]
The lack of trust between communities and health systems has been cited by the World Health Organization as a significant factor in fueling West Africa’s Ebola epidemic. Many communities did not follow officially recommended practices—such as safe funeral and burial rites. Others did not cooperate with contact tracing ‒ identifying people who may have been close to an infected […]
Recently, HFG co-hosted the International Course on Decentralization in the Health Sector in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The course, based on international experience in health sector decentralization, was led by faculty from the Kinshasa School of Public Health (KSPH) in close collaboration with with Dr. Tom Bossert of Harvard University’s T.H. Chan School […]
Dr. Pablos-Mendez, Assistant Administrator, Bureau of Global Health, recently launched USAID’s Health Systems Benchmarking Tool(HSBT) at an event in Crystal City. The HSBT compares low-, middle-, and upper middle-income countries on health system functions, outcomes and impact indicators. “It is the ability to benchmark across countries, adjust variables, and produce data for planning, that transforms our ability to […]
Nigeria is undergoing transitions in the financing of its health sector as part of the effort to achieve universal health coverage (UHC). Like many other developing countries embarking on this journey, Nigeria seeks to greatly decrease out-of-pocket spending on health services and increase government health spending per person, with the ultimate aim of improved access […]
Countries must have a firm grasp on their health financing landscape in order to ensure sufficient and effective use of resources. Health Accounts—an internationally standardized methodology that allows a country to understand the source, magnitude, and flow of funds through its health sector—provide a wealth of information on past spending. When combined with macroeconomic, health utilization, and health […]
When dwindling external funding for health coincides with economic growth and increasing government revenue in recipient countries, it is only natural to clamor for increased domestic financing for health – the argument is seamless and logical. This is the scenario in the global health arena today, especially among the 28 countries rising to middle-income status […]
