| Resumen: |
Most health care systems end up spending some of their money badly. In Egypt, one in five children are stunted, but 20 percent of public expenditure goes to send a very few patients overseas for medical treatment. India funds open-heart surgery while children die of diseases that could be prevented by vaccines that cost a few cents.
While health gains have been significant in low- and middleincome countries in recent years, relatively low coverage of highly cost-effective health interventions continues to co-exist with public spending on high-cost, less effective or even ineffective care. Evidence from around the world demonstrates missed opportunities
to improve health through reallocation of public monies towards more cost-effective interventions. India could reduce deaths by almost 30 percent via reallocation within their existing public budget.
Moving money from least cost-effective interventions to most cost-effective interventions can potentially produce about 15,000
times the benefit for people’s health.
Over the past decades, global health experts have focused on financing and purchasing as the central policy instruments to improve the impact of health spending. While such policies are important in determining who gets what health benefits, these instruments have generally been neutral or silent on the choices of which health interventions, services, and products will actually
be funded by public and donor monies. These choices may be as important for health impact as the financing and purchasing arrangements in place.
|
