This blog was originally posted on the Health Policy Plus website. For many low- and middle-income countries, donor funding is needed to directly support access to “free” health services, such as family planning and HIV, in public facilities. At the recent Family Planning 2020 (FP2020) meeting in Ethiopia, while talking about insurance integration as a [more…]

People drive health systems. I think a lot about health worker performance and productivity in my work with the HRH2030 Program. After all, a health system’s strength—and ultimately the health of any population—depends upon the strength of its health workforce. However, too often health workers are not very well supported, under-resourced, and poorly managed at [more…]

This blog was originally published on the USAID Learning Lab website. USAID’s approach to development – the Journey to Self-Reliance – focuses our collective efforts on building the capacity and commitment of partner countries to lead their own development. As Administrator Mark Green has said, “the purpose of foreign assistance should be ending its need [more…]

This blog was originally published on the Health Research Program website. The Zika outbreak greatly affected several Latin American and Caribbean countries to the extent that the World Health Organization declared it an international public health emergency on February 1, 2016. USAID is assessing the extent to which the outbreak affected Maternal, Newborn and Child [more…]

Leaders often face challenges and pressures that may prevent them from taking the necessary actions for organizational change. Chief executives in the public sector can be especially vulnerable when powerful unions and political maneuverings make change risky. No wonder leaders are hesitant to embark on such a perilous journey. There are many frameworks and tools [more…]

By Myra L. Betron, Gender Director, Jhpiego When I began my journey toward a career in gender and global development, I was a graduate student studying international relations and economics. To me, investing in girls’ education and economic empowerment was an obvious priority —so much so that I investigated the cost-benefit analysis of girls education [more…]

One disadvantage in the public service sector is that it is hard to gauge efficiency. Profit per staff member or procurements (projects) won can be determined, but there are too many factors not under the organization’s control that influence this variable. So what does efficiency in the nonprofit sector mean? Over the last few years [more…]

This blog was originally published on the Health Research Program website. The world is becoming increasingly urbanized. Urbanization is happening at a particularly rapid rate in low and middle-income countries. The majority of the world’s urban population lives in less economically developed regions.1 With rapid urban population expansion, some estimates have pegged the growth rate [more…]

By Laurie Werner, Global Director, BID Initiative, PATH Immunization is one of the most cost-effective public health interventions. But even as countries achieve national and global targets for immunization coverage, they often face challenges immunizing the children who are hardest to reach with life-saving vaccines. Led by PATH in partnership with the governments of Tanzania [more…]

When community health programs are well-designed, managed, and sufficiently funded, they can yield substantial health and economic benefits. In addition to contributing to a healthier, more productive population, they can reduce the risk of costly epidemics while generating substantial cost savings for families and health systems.1 On the other hand, when poorly designed or managed [more…]