Kenya has progressed towards implementing and institutionalizing strategic health purchasing (SHP) practices as a key strategy to achieving universal health coverage (UHC). However, multiple challenges are faced such as fragmentation of pooling arrangements, inadequate health funding, rigid...

Although the proportion of the world’s population living in poverty has declined substantially over the last two decades, the absolute number of people that live in poverty or vulnerable conditions has remained high. Nearly 70% of the poor now live in countries classified as middle-income.3 We...

Many countries are now transitioning away from donor aid for health as they move from low- to middle-income status and see improved health outcomes. To promote better planning and preparedness for transition, many transition readiness assessment tools (TRAs) have been developed in recent years....

As more countries move from low- to middle-income status, they are perceived as increasingly capable of financing their own health systems. Some donors have begun to transition their support out of such middle-income countries (MICs) to redirect their funds to countries with greater needs....

In the coming years, over a dozen middle-income countries (MICs) are likely to transition from multilateral concessional assistance, including assistance from the International Development Association (IDA) and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance (Gavi). The cohort of upcoming graduates, which includes...

India is a lower-middle-income country (LMIC) with 21% of its population living below the international poverty line. Yet, its government health expenditure in 2016 was only 1.17% of its ross domestic product (GDP), a share that is even lower than the average for low-income countries. India also...

Strategic purchasing (SP) for health is an important policy lever to influence health service provision and accelerate progress toward universal health coverage (UHC). The effectiveness of SP in reaching UHC goals is limited if there is poor coordination and fragmentation between schemes. We...

This study explored strategic purchasing of health services in Sierra Leone. Purchasing of healthservices in Sierra Leone is at a formative stage. Our study identified nine such purchasing schemes, which can be grouped into five major categories of purchasers: a) the ministry of health and...

This study aimed to identify lessons on strategic purchasing (SP) reforms in the health sector in Cameroon, with a specific focus on performance-based financing and the voucher system. Specifically, we aimed to identify: (i) current progress, challenges, and opportunities related to the...

Although strategic purchasing is increasingly advocated as one of the solutions for improving the performance of the health system, purchasing in Senegal has been mostly passive. Some active purchasing mechanisms have been recently introduced as part of the country’s health financing strategy...