Health Equity: 10/06/11

Thursday, October 6, 2011

[EQ] Steps towards the health equity agenda in Chile

Steps towards the health equity agenda in Chile

Jeanette Vega, Center for Epidemiology and Public Health Policy, Universidad del Desarrollo de Chile
Background paper: WHO - World Conference on Social Determinants of Health, 19-21 October 2011, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Available online PDF [69p.] at: http://bit.ly/nn04kw

“……This paper describes:

· The main strategies of the Steps toward an Equity in Health agenda implemented in the Ministry of Health and Regional Health Authorities in Chile between 2008 and 2010. The challenges faced in going to scale on an Equity and Social Determinants of Health (SDH) strategy in the health sector at a national level. Specifically it will highlight:
a. Some of the main challenges associated with managing policy change particularly in the area of public health programs that have had a long history of business as usual.
b. The strategy used to manage intersectoral processes and to incorporate the community voice
c. The competency development strategy used to secure and promote institutional

· Discussion: Lessons learnt and future challenges…..”

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[EQ] Heartfile Health Financing: Striving to achieve health equity in Pakistan

Heartfile Health Financing: Striving to achieve health equity in Pakistan

Sania Nishtar, Faraz Khalid, Anis Kazi, Naheed Batool, Andleeb Ikram, Ihtiram ul Haque Khattak, Qazi Asmat Isa, Hamid Jaffar

Background paper: WHO - World Conference on Social Determinants of Health, 19-21 October 2011, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Available online PDF [18p.] at: http://bit.ly/rs9lHI

“……More than 73% of Pakistan’s population pays out-of-pocket to access healthcare. Catastrophic expenditures on health, medical indebtedness and medical impoverishment are therefore, a common occurrence. More than 40 million individuals run the risk of spending catastrophically on healthcare. A number of factors compel action as social divides widen in Pakistan.
Social protection is a government priority but existing mechanisms have limitations. The state’s health related social protection system in place centers on Zakat and Bait-ul-Mal. These have narrow coverage and are plagued by a number of challenges. An NGO think-tank has created a mechanism to fill this gap through its recently established program, Heartfile Health Financing.

This is a health-equity fund based demand side system, which enables registered doctors/hospitals to seek financial help for patients who run the risk of spending catastrophically on healthcare in an expedient and transparent manner.

The system comprises three components—a technology platform, a system of validating poverty and prioritizing patients, and a health equity fund.

The objective at inception was two fold: one, to develop a system, which at the humanitarian level could protect people against medical impoverishment and meet an urgent need amongst the poor. Secondly, at the development level, to develop a health relevant social protection system which suited the specific needs of Pakistan and could help broaden the base of pooling for health.. …..”

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[EQ] WHO interactive atlases on health equity in Europe

WHO interactive atlases on health equity in Europe

Website: http://bit.ly/rceVa5

“….One of the goals of the project is to improve availability of and access to evidence on inequalities in health system performance, including quality of care and the structural determinants of such inequalities across countries and regions in Europe.

To meet this goal, publicly available socioeconomic and health-related indicators from EUROSTAT databases have been used to produce the atlases. The NUTS 2 regions are the main geographical units of analysis. Variables displayed in maps, graphs and tables represent more than 600 individual indicators.

The atlases aim not only to provide more visibility to the sub-national patterns of health and their determinants but also to analyse how such an integrated information system and its underlying data can inform policy across European countries. The added value is to: improve insight into the regional dimension of social inequalities in health across counties; provide a tool for increased engagement of the public and the media in the dialogue with the competent authorities on health policy and action; and provide a pilot for a more regular monitoring and assessment of the magnitude of social inequalities in health and the impact of the relevant policies, interventions and services

To analyse and display data, following interactive atlases have been developed in the project:

1. Correlation map atlas allows a quick visualization of two variables in maps and their association in a graph, where correlation analysis can also be performed. You may use the filter function to select only one country or country group.

2. Atlases of social inequalities allow visualization of difference between the target value and the value in a region or group of regions. The target value is the population weighted average of the most advantaged quintile of the population. Differences between the target and the individual region are visualized as absolute differences (area target differences) and as relative differences (area target ratios).

3. Regional comparison atlas allows quick comparison of several key indicators between a limited numbers of regions. Please use the Ctrl key and mouse to select the regions of interest.

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