Whether Governments should charge patients fees to use public health services has become one of the most contentious social policy issues worldwide. Sadly for policy makers, in recent years, the quality of debate in this area has often been poor, with opposing camps usually resorting to unproven theory and emotive rhetoric. Perhaps a new perspective should be brought to this debate. How would the world of business deal with this problem; which in effect, is an issue of what (if any) price one should charge for health services?
Resource allocation and health financing
International experiences in removing user fees for health services; Implications for Mozambique
Yates R: DFID Health Resource Centre, 2006
Working together for better health
Department for International Development, 5 June 2007
Hilary Benn of DFId calls for the global community to deliver better health for poorer people around the world.
Estimated global resources needed to attain universal coverage of maternal and newborn health services
Johns B, Sigurbjörnsdóttir K, Fogstad H, Zupan J, Mathaid M, Tan-Torres Edejer T: Bulletin of the World Health Organization 85 (4): 257-263, April 2007
A minimum yearly average increase in resources of US$ 3.9 billion is needed to scale up maternal and newborn health services within the context of the Millennium Development Goals, although annual costs increase over the time period of the model. When more rapid rates of scale-up are assumed, this minimum figure may be as high as US$ 5.6 billion per year. The 10-year estimated incremental costs range from US$ 39.3 billion for a moderate scale-up scenario to US$ 55.7 billion for the rapid scale-up scenario. These projections of future financial costs may be used as a starting point for mobilizing global resources. Countries will have to further refine these estimates, but these figures may serve as goals towards which donors can direct their plans. Further research is needed to measure the costs of health system reforms, such as recruiting, training and retaining a sufficient number of personnel.
Tanzanian Prime Minister calls on regional leaders to increase health spending to 15% of national budgets
The Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health: 17 April 2007
More than 300 delegates gathered at the first-ever assembly of The Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health. Hosted by the Government of Tanzania, the Partner's Forum (17-20 April 2007) declared that action is urgently required, if high rates of unjust deaths of mothers, babies and children in poor countries are to be reversed.
The case for social health insurance
Balfour-Kaipa T: Comment, Mail&Guardian, 4 April 2007
Social health insurance is critical for improving equity in our health system, which is characterised by tremendous disparities between public and private care. As much as there have been increases in real terms in the budgets for public health services, more funding is still required, especially in light of additional demands posed by HIV and Aids.
WHA must draw up emergency plans to bridge health financing and health worker gaps in Africa
Richards T: World AIDS Campaign, 15 May 2007
In a statement ahead of the WHA meetings, APHRA coordinator Rotimi Sankore stated: “The World Health Assembly has in the past three years passed several resolutions on health financing and health worker shortages - yet there has been an overall increase in annual African deaths resulting from lack of sustainable health finance and health worker shortages. The worlds Health Ministers must now move from passing resolutions to effecting resolutions and emergency action to end the deaths of over 8 million Africans a year to preventable, treatable and manageable diseases, caused mainly by maternal mortality, child mortality, HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria.”
Counting the cost of changing malaria drug policy in Tanzania
id21 Health News, 3 November 2006
In 2001, the Tanzanian government changed their malaria treatment policy from chloroquine (CQ) to sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine (SP) as the first-line drug. How much did this policy change cost? Researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK, assess the costs and make recommendations for other countries undertaking treatment policy change.
Equity in health care in Namibia: developing a needs-based resource allocation formula using principal components analysis
Zere E, Mandlhate C, Mbeeli T, Shangula K, Mutirua K, Kapenambili W
The pace of redressing inequities in the distribution of scarce health care resources in Namibia has been slow. This is due primarily to adherence to the historical incrementalist type of budgeting that has been used to allocate resources. Those regions with high levels of deprivation and relatively greater need for health care resources have been getting less than their fair share. To rectify this situation, which was inherited from the apartheid system, there is a need to develop a needs-based resource allocation mechanism.
KZN Health budgets about R506 million for TB
BuaNews, 26 Apr 2007
As part of government's initiatives to help manage the severe tuberculosis strains identified in KwaZulu-Natal, the provincial Health Department has set aside about R506 million writes Nozipho Dlamini. The extremely drug resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) strain resists all first level drugs (ordinary treatment given to TB patients) and two of the five major classes of the second-level drugs used to treat patients with multi-drug resistant TB (MDR TB). "For the MDR and XDR TB strains specifically, we are allocating R80 million, which forms part of our TB Crises management Plan," MEC Peggy Nkonyeni said, tabling her department's budget for this financial year.
Reversing the trend of weak policy implementation in the Kenyan health sector? – a study of budget allocation and spending of health resources versus set priorities
Glenngård AH, Maina TM: Health Research Policy and Systems 5:3, 29 March 2007
Policy implementation in the context of health systems is generally difficult and the Kenyan health sector situation is not an exception. In 2005, a new health sector strategic plan that outlines the vision and the policy direction of the health sector was launched and during the same year the health sector was allocated a substantial budget increment. On basis of these indications of a willingness to improve the health care system among policy makers, the objective of this study was to assess whether there was a change in policy implementation during 2005 in Kenya.