scholarly journals The challenge of middle-income countries to development assistance for health: recipients, funders, both or neither?

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 265-284 ◽  
Author(s):  
Trygve Ottersen ◽  
Suerie Moon ◽  
John-Arne Røttingen

AbstractRecent developments have transformed the role and characteristics of middle-income countries (MICs). Many stakeholders now question the appropriate role of MICs in the system of development assistance for health (DAH), and key funders have already recast their approach to these countries. The pressing question is whether MICs should be recipients, funders, both or neither. The answer has deep implications for individual countries and their citizens, and for the DAH system as a whole. We clarify the fundamental issues involved and emphasise a special feature of many MICs: mid-level gross national income per capita (GNIpc) combined with substantial health needs and large inequalities. We discuss the trade-off between concerns for capacity and need, and illustrate a capacity-based approach to setting the level of a GNIpc eligibility threshold. We also discuss how needs-based exceptions and incentive-preserving instruments can complement such a threshold. Against this background, we outline options for the future roles of MICs in various circumstances. We conclude that major players in the DAH system have reason to reconsider the criteria for allocating DAH among countries and the norms for which countries should contribute and how much.

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 245-263
Author(s):  
Trygve Ottersen ◽  
Suerie Moon ◽  
John-Arne Røttingen

AbstractAfter years of unprecedented growth in development assistance for health (DAH), the DAH system is challenged on several fronts: by the economic downturn and stagnation of DAH, by the epidemiological transition and increase in non-communicable diseases and by the economic transition and rise of the middle-income countries. Central to any potent response is a fair and effective allocation of DAH across countries. A myriad of criteria has been proposed or is currently used, but there have been no comprehensive assessment of their distributional implications. We simulated the implications of 11 quantitative allocation criteria across countries and country categories. We found that the distributions varied profoundly. The group of low-income countries received most DAH from needs-based criteria linked to domestic capacity, while the group of upper-middle-income countries was most favoured by an income-inequality criterion. Compared to a baseline distribution guided by gross national income per capita, low-income countries received less DAH by almost all criteria. The findings can inform funders when examining and revising the criteria they use, and provide input to the broader debate about what criteria should be used.


2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 223-244 ◽  
Author(s):  
Trygve Ottersen ◽  
Aparna Kamath ◽  
Suerie Moon ◽  
Lene Martinsen ◽  
John-Arne Røttingen

AbstractAfter years of unprecedented growth in development assistance for health (DAH), the system is challenged on several fronts: by the economic downturn and stagnation of DAH, by the epidemiological transition and increase in non-communicable diseases, and by the economic transition and rise of the middle-income countries. This raises questions about which countries should receive DAH and how much, and, fundamentally, what criteria that promote fair and effective allocation. Yet, no broad comparative assessment exists of the criteria used today. We reviewed the allocation criteria stated by five multilateral and nine bilateral funders of DAH. We found that several funders had only limited information about concrete criteria publicly available. Moreover, many funders not devoted to health lacked specific criteria for DAH or criteria directly related to health, and no funder had criteria directly related to inequality. National income per capita was emphasised by many funders, but the associated eligibility thresholds varied considerably. These findings and the broad overview of criteria can assist funders in critically examining and revising the criteria they use, and inform the wider debate about what the optimal criteria are.


2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (Supplement_2) ◽  
pp. ii18-ii27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hina Khalid ◽  
Sitara Gill ◽  
Ashley M Fox

Abstract Development assistance for health (DAH) has increased dramatically over the past two decades, and this increase has led to a debate on the benefits and perverse effects of scaling-up vs scaling back DAH, and the type of interventions DAH should support. Nutrition remains a contested category viewed as essential to achieving primary healthcare objectives but as falling outside of the direct ambit of the health system. Thus, despite the increase in DAH, it continues to remain an underfunded area and little is known about the relationship between aid for nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive interventions and the proportion of stunted children across low- and middle-income countries. We hypothesize that as nutrition-specific aid targets local needs of countries and is less fungible than nutrition-sensitive aid, it will contribute more to a reduction in the proportion of stunted children, with the steepest gains among countries that have the highest burden of malnutrition. We use fixed-effects regressions to examine the relationship between the proportion of stunted children and aid for nutrition interventions (specific and sensitive) to 116 low- and middle-income countries (2002–16). We construct our panel using the Creditor Reporting System, Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation, Food and Agriculture Organization, World Health Organization and World Development indicators databases. We find a one-dollar increase in per capita nutrition-specific aid is associated with a reduction in the proportion of stunted children by 0.004 (P < 0.05). When stratified by burden of malnutrition, a one-dollar increase in per capita nutrition-specific aid to countries with the highest burden of malnutrition is associated with sharper reductions in the proportion of stunted children (0.013, P < 0.01). We also find a significant association for per capita nutrition-sensitive aid and proportion of stunted children when per capita aid for nutrition is lagged by 3 and 4 years (0.0002, P < 0.05), suggesting a long-run association between nutrition-sensitive aid and proportion of stunted children. Our findings suggest that in spite of criticisms that development assistance fails to adequately reach its intended beneficiaries, aid for nutrition has been successful at reducing the proportion of stunted children. Our findings imply a need to scale-up nutrition funding and improve targeting of aid.


Author(s):  
Shuhei Nomura ◽  
Haruka Sakamoto ◽  
Aya Ishizuka ◽  
Kenji Shibuya

Development assistance for health (DAH) is an important part of financing healthcare in low- and middle-income countries. We estimated the gross disbursement of DAH of the 29 Development Assistance Committee (DAC) member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) for 2011–2019; and clarified its flows, including aid type, channel, target region, and target health focus area. Data from the OECD iLibrary were used. The DAH definition was based on the OECD sector classification. For core funding to non-health-specific multilateral agencies, we estimated DAH and its flows based on the OECD methodology for calculating imputed multilateral official development assistance (ODA). The total amount of DAH for all countries combined was 18.5 billion USD in 2019, at 17.4 USD per capita, with the 2011–2019 average of 19.7 billion USD. The average share of DAH in ODA for the 29 countries was about 7.9% in 2019. Between 2011 and 2019, most DAC countries allocated approximately 60% of their DAH to primary health care, with the remaining 40% allocated to health system strengthening. We expect that the estimates of this study will help DAC member countries strategize future DAH wisely, efficiently, and effectively while ensuring transparency.


2015 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-149 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ulrike Grittner ◽  
Zsofia Nemeth ◽  
Sandra Kuntsche ◽  
Beate Gaertner ◽  
Kim Bloomfield

Grittner, U., Nemeth, Z., Kuntsche, S., Gaertner, B., & Bloomfield, K. (2015). What is the role of roles? Exploring the link between social roles and women’s alcohol use in low- and middle-income countries. The International Journal Of Alcohol And Drug Research, 4(2), 139-149. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.7895/ijadr.v4i2.211Aims: This paper investigates how social roles are related to alcohol use among women in low- and middle-income countries.Methods: Cross-sectional data were used from 25-49-years-old women in 11 low- and middle-income countries from the GenACIS project. Dependent variables were current drinking and risky drinking (10+gr/day). Information on partnership, parenthood and having paid labour were used as social role measures. Multiple and multilevel regression analyses were carried out to test whether holding several roles are related to current and risky drinking.Results: Having paid work was associated with current and risky drinking across countries. Having a partner and having children were associated with a higher likelihood of abstention. With regard to country level characteristics per capita consumption was significantly related to both current drinking and risky drinking among women, while gross national income was significantly associated only with current drinking. Gender equality within the country did not have a significant association with women’s drinking. Concerning differing role combinations, working single women without children were most likely to be risky drinkers, while women who were not working and had a partner and children were the least likely.Conclusions: Paid labour was a substantial singular factor positively associated with women’s drinking. In addition, with the exception of Argentina and Kazakhstan, high per capita consumption on country level was associated with higher prevalence of risky drinking among women.


Author(s):  
Harry Minas

This chapter provides an overview of what is known about prevalence, social determinants, treatment, and course and impact of depression in developing, or low- and middle-income, countries. The importance of culture in depression and in the construction and application of diagnostic classifications and in health and social services is highlighted, with a particular focus on the applicability of ‘Western’ diagnostic constructs and service systems in developing country settings. The role of international organizations, such as WHO, and international development programs, such as the SDGs, in improving our understanding of depression and in developing effective and culturally appropriate responses is briefly examined. There is both a need and increasing opportunities in developing countries for greater commitment to mental health of populations, increased investment in mental health and social services, and culturally informed research that will contribute to improved global understanding of mental disorders in general and depression in particular.


2021 ◽  
pp. 004947552098277
Author(s):  
Madhu Kharel ◽  
Alpha Pokharel ◽  
Krishna P Sapkota ◽  
Prasant V Shahi ◽  
Pratisha Shakya ◽  
...  

Evidence-based decision-making is less common in low- and middle-income countries where the research capacity remains low. Nepal, a lower-middle-income country in Asia, is not an exception. We conducted a rapid review to identify the trend of health research in Nepal and found more than seven-fold increase in the number of published health-related articles between 2000 and 2018. The proportion of articles with Nepalese researchers as the first authors has also risen over the years, though they are still only in two-thirds of the articles in 2018.


2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. e004858
Author(s):  
Modhurima Moitra ◽  
Ian Cogswell ◽  
Emilie Maddison ◽  
Kyle Simpson ◽  
Hayley Stutzman ◽  
...  

IntroductionIn 2017, development assistance for health (DAH) comprised 5.3% of total health spending in low-income countries. Despite the key role DAH plays in global health-spending, little is known about the characteristics of assistance that may be associated with committed assistance that is actually disbursed. In this analysis, we examine associations between these characteristics and disbursement of committed assistance.MethodsWe extracted data from the Creditor Reporting System of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, and the WHO National Health Accounts database. Factors examined were off-budget assistance, administrative assistance, publicly sourced assistance and assistance to health systems strengthening. Recipient-country characteristics examined were perceived level of corruption, civil fragility and gross domestic product per capita (GDPpc). We used linear regression methods for panel of data to assess the proportion of committed aid that was disbursed for a given country-year, for each data source.ResultsFactors that were associated with a higher disbursement rates include off-budget aid (p<0.001), lower administrative expenses (p<0.01), lower perceived corruption in recipient country (p<0.001), lower fragility in recipient country (p<0.05) and higher GDPpc (p<0.05).ConclusionSubstantial gaps remain between commitments and disbursements. Characteristics of assistance (administrative, publicly sourced) and indicators of government transparency and fragility are also important drivers associated with disbursement of DAH. There remains a continued need for better aid flow reporting standards and clarity around aid types for better measurement of DAH.


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 2333794X2110222
Author(s):  
Ravi K. Mooli ◽  
Kalaimaran Sadasivam

Many children needing pediatric intensive care units care require inotropes, which are started peripherally prior to securing a central venous access. However, many hospitals in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) may not have access to central lines and the vasoactive medications are frequently given through a peripheral venous access. Aim: The aim of our study was to describe the role of peripheral vasoactive inotropes in children. Methods: Children requiring peripheral vasoactive medications were included in this study. We retrospectively collected data at 2 time points on use and complications of peripheral vasoactive medications. Results: Eighty-four children (51 pre-COVID era and 33 COVID pandemic) received peripheral vasoactive medications. Only 3% of children (3/84) developed extravasation injury, all of whom recovered completely. Conclusions: Results from our study suggest that extravasation injury due to peripheral inotrope infusion is very low (3%) and it may be safely administered in children at a diluted concentration.


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