Priority-setting for achieving universal health coverage

Abstract There is a growing consensus that fair priority-setting and the right to health contribute to achieving universal health coverage. The right to health creates legal entitlements to receive care and fair priority-setting promotes efficient and just health systems. However, there can be tension between them, particularly when the right to health is judicially protected. This article analyses three approaches to understanding this tension: the first minimises the conflicts between them to emphasise their synergies; the second admits the tension and considers it positive as rights create and protect substantive entitlements against priority-setting decisions; the third also recognises that this tension exists, but sees these substantive entitlements as obstacles for fair priority-setting. Building on the analysis of these approaches, this article argues that the involvement of courts in allocative decisions can be more comprehensively evaluated by assessing whether they promote or impair fair priority-setting rather than by focusing on the direct beneficiaries of judicial decisions. If this argument is correct, then courts using the right to health to create and enforce substantive entitlements to health treatments becomes very questionable.

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Health Technology Assessment: Global Advocacy and Local Realities Comment on "Priority Setting for Universal Health Coverage: We Need Evidence-Informed Deliberative Processes, Not Just More Evidence on Cost-Effectiveness"

International Journal of Health Policy and Management ◽

10.15171/ijhpm.2016.118 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 6 (4) ◽

pp. 233-236 ◽

Cited By ~ 18

Author(s):

Kalipso Chalkidou ◽

Ryan Li ◽

Anthony J. Culyer ◽

Amanda Glassman ◽

Karen J. Hofman ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Cost Effectiveness ◽

Health Technology Assessment ◽

Universal Health Coverage ◽

Priority Setting ◽

Technology Assessment ◽

Health Technology ◽

Health Coverage ◽

Deliberative Processes ◽

Universal Health

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Priority-setting to integrate sexual and reproductive health into universal health coverage: the case of Malaysia

Sexual and Reproductive Health Matters ◽

10.1080/26410397.2020.1842153 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 28 (2) ◽

pp. 1842153

Author(s):

Shiang Cheng Lim ◽

Yee Chern Yap ◽

Sima Barmania ◽

Veloshnee Govender ◽

Georges Danhoundo ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Reproductive Health ◽

Universal Health Coverage ◽

Priority Setting ◽

Sexual And Reproductive Health ◽

Health Coverage ◽

Universal Health

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Setting Priorities in the Pursuit of Universal Health Coverage

Global Health Priority-Setting ◽

10.1093/oso/9780190912765.003.0017 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 299-314

Author(s):

Trygve Ottersen ◽

Ole F. Norheim

Keyword(s):

Universal Health Coverage ◽

Priority Setting ◽

Service Selection ◽

Decision Makers ◽

Health Coverage ◽

Recent Developments ◽

Thai Government ◽

Past Experiences ◽

Universal Health

Priority-setting is fundamental to the fair and efficient pursuit of universal health coverage (UHC). This chapter addresses the key choices in selecting services for UHC and the alternative criteria, tools, and processes to guide these choices. The authors first describe the choices decision-makers have to make on the path to UHC and the recommendations by the WHO Consultative Group on Equity and Universal Health Coverage for how these choices can be made. Using Thailand as a case study, the authors examine how the Thai government has set priorities in its pursuit of UHC. Against this background, the authors discuss alternative criteria, tools, and processes for guiding service selection and the design of benefit packages for UHC. When doing this, the authors consider past experiences in Thailand and other countries and examine how recent developments and the insights from the preceding chapters in this volume can provide directions for the future.

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