Understanding the Impact of Intergovernmental Relations on Public Health: Lessons from Reform Initiatives in the Blood System and Health Surveillance

Establishing effective intergovernmental relations is a key challenge to the development of successful public health policy. The first step in establishing a literature on this subject is to create a framework for characterizing the different forms of intergovernmental relations that exist in public health. This article provides a framework for synthesizing existing relevant literature, identifying gaps in knowledge, and ultimately developing national policies more favourable to public health. We apply this model to the case of blood safety, draw comparisons with health surveillance and derive a set of proposals to optimize the impact of intergovernmental relations on public health.