Progress in reducing tobacco use is a key indicator for measuring countries’ efforts to implement the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control – target 3.a under the Sustainable Development Goals agenda. Countries have adopted this indicator to report progress also towards the tobacco reducti...on target under the Global Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases 2013–2020 and the WHO’s Global Programme of Work triple billions target.
Fourth edition.
more
The 2020 Financing for Sustainable Development Report, the fifth report of the Inter-agency Task Force on Financing for Development, provides a comprehensive assessment of the state of sustainable finance. Prepared by more than 60 agencies of the United Nations system and partner international organ...izations, the report brings together a wide range of expertise and perspectives. It puts forward a set of policy recommendations to mobilize financing flows, and align them with economic, social and environmental priorities. These recommendations should assist Member States and all other stakeholders as they work toward fully implementing the Addis Agenda and achieve the SDGs.
more
The thirty-seventh meeting of the Programme, Budget and Administration Committee was held in Geneva from 25 to 27 January 2023 and chaired by Ms Aishath Rishmee (Maldives). The Committee adopted its agenda and agreed its programme of work. In his opening remarks, the Director-General emphasized the ...crucial work on the financial future of the Organization, most significantly implementation of the Programme budget 2022−2023 and development of the Proposed programme budget 2024−2025, which would be the first to benefit from the agreed increase in assessed contributions. He welcomed the work of the Agile Member States Task Group on Strengthening WHO’s Budgetary, Programmatic and Financing Governance with its recommendations for long-term improvements in reform, prevention of and response to sexual abuse and harassment, new web-based information portals and a new replenishment process for consideration by Member States. Efforts were also under way to improve impact at country level, and he would continue to report to Member States on progress. He was heading an agile, proactive and fast-responding WHO, committed to implementing plans approved by Member States.
more
Background: Tracking of financial resources to maternal, newborn, and child health provides crucial information to assess accountability of donors. We analysed official development assistance (ODA) flows to maternal, newborn, and child health for 2009 and 2010, and assessed progress since our monito...ring began in 2003.
Methods: We coded and analysed all 2009 and 2010 aid activities from the database of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, according to a functional classification of activities and whether all or a proportion of the value of the disbursement contributed towards maternal, newborn, and child health. We analysed trends since 2003, and reported two indicators for monitoring donor disbursements: ODA to child health per child and ODA to maternal and newborn health per livebirth. We analysed the degree to which donors allocated ODA to 74 countries with the highest maternal and child mortality rates (Countdown priority countries) with time and by type of donor.
more
Background: Tracking of aid resources to reproductive, maternal, newborn, and child health (RMNCH) provides timely and crucial information to hold donors accountable. For the first time, we examine flows in official development assistance (ODA) and grants from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (co...llectively termed ODA+) in relation to the continuum of care for RMNCH and assess progress since 2003. Methods: We coded and analysed financial disbursements for maternal, newborn, and child health (MNCH) and for reproductive health (R*) to all recipient countries worldwide from all donors reporting to the creditor reporting system database for the years 2011–12. We also included grants from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. We analysed trends for MNCH for the period 2003–12 and for R* for the period 2009–12.
more
Background: Timely reliable data on aid flows to maternal, newborn, and child health are essential for assessing the adequacy of current levels of funding, and to promote accountability among donors for attainment of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) for child and maternal health. We provide g...lobal estimates of official development assistance (ODA) to maternal, newborn, and child health in 2003 and 2004, drawing on data reported by high-income donor countries and aid agencies to the Organisation for Economic Development and Cooperation.
Methods: ODA was tracked on a project-by-project basis to 150 developing countries. We applied a standard definition of maternal, newborn, and child health across donors, and included not only funds specific to these areas, but also integrated health funds and disease-specific funds allocated on a proportional distribution basis, using appropriate factors.
more
Background: Foreign aid has been shown to be favourably biased towards small countries. This study investigated whether country size bias also occurs in national malaria policy and development assistance from international agencies. Methods: Data from publicly available sources were collected with c...ountries as observational units. The exploratory data analysis was based on the conceptual framework with socio-economic, environmental and institutional parameters. The strength of relationships was estimated by the Pearson and polychoric correlation coefficients. The correlation matrix was explored by factor analysis.
more
We created a dataset to generate estimates of donor-reported ‘official development assistance’ and private grants (ODA+) to reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health (RMNCH) by donor, recipient country and activity type over the period 2003–2013. We collected disbursement information fr...om the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development Creditor Reporting System (CRS) in January 2015. All 2.1 million records across all sectors were coded based on donor name, project title, short and long descriptions, and CRS code describing the purpose of the disbursement. We classified records according to the degree to which they would promote attainment of Millennium Development Goals 4 and 5 (reproductive and sexual health, maternal and newborn health, and child health). We also classified records according to whether they supported prenatal and neonatal health (PNH). The dataset includes project funding as well as allocating shares of general budget support, health sector support and basket funding. The data can be used to analyse resource flows to RMNCH or to other purposes or beneficiaries of ODA+.
more
Background: Disbursements of development assistance for health (DAH) have risen substantially during the past several decades. More recently, the international community's attention has turned to other international challenges, introducing uncertainty about the future of disbursements for DAH.
Meth...ods: We collected audited budget statements, annual reports, and project-level records from the main international agencies that disbursed DAH from 1990 to the end of 2015. We standardised and combined records to provide a comprehensive set of annual disbursements. We tracked each dollar of DAH back to the source and forward to the recipient. We removed transfers between agencies to avoid double-counting and adjusted for inflation. We classified assistance into nine primary health focus areas: HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, maternal health, newborn and child health, other infectious diseases, non-communicable diseases, Ebola, and sector-wide approaches and health system strengthening. For our statistical analysis, we grouped these health focus areas into two categories: MDG-related focus areas (HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, child and newborn health, and maternal health) and non-MDG-related focus areas (other infectious diseases, non-communicable diseases, sector-wide approaches, and other). We used linear regression to test for structural shifts in disbursement patterns at the onset of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs; ie, from 2000) and the global financial crisis (impact estimated to occur in 2010). We built on past trends and associations with an ensemble model to estimate DAH through the end of 2040.
more
The global economic crisis that began to unfold in 2008 has raised serious concerns about the ability of developing countries to meet targets for improvements in population health outcomes, and about the ability of developed countries to meet their commitments to fund health programmes in developing... countries. This uncertainty underscores the importance of tracking spending on global health, to ensure resources are directed efficiently to the world's most pressing health issues.
more
Background: Investing in the health workforce is key to achieving the health-related Sustainable Development Goals. However, achieving these Goals requires addressing a projected global shortage of 18 million health workers (mostly in low- and middle-income countries). Within that context, in 2016, ...the World Health Assembly adopted the WHO Global Strategy on Human Resources for Health: Workforce 2030. In the Strategy, the role of official development assistance to support the health workforce is an area of interest. The objective of this study is to examine progress on implementing the Global Strategy by updating previous analyses that estimated and examined official development assistance targeted towards human resources for health. Methods: We leveraged data from IHME’s Development Assistance for Health database, COVID development assistance database and the OECD’s Creditor Reporting System online database. We utilized an updated keyword list to identify the relevant human resources for health-related activities from the project databases. When possible, we also estimated the fraction of human resources for health projects that considered and/or focused on gender as a key factor. We described trends, examined changes in the availability of human resources for health-related development assistance since the adoption of the Global Strategy and compared disease burden and availability of donor resources.
more
Neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) is an umbrella term for a diverse group of debilitating infections that represent the most common afflictions for 2.7 billion people living on less than US$2 per day. Major efforts have recently re-focused attention on NTDs, including structured advocacy by the Bil...l and Melinda Gates Foundation, technical and political support by WHO and large-scale drug donation programs by pharmaceutical companies. An analysis of the Official Development Assistance (ODA) for NTDs in 2009 showed that Development Assistance Committee members and multilateral donors had largely ignored funding NTD control projects. This study reviews the changes since 2009 and finds an increased engagement by pharmaceutical manufacturers through drug donation programs substantially increased by the ‘London Declaration’ in 2012, a focused effort of 77 public and private partners on control or elimination of the 10 most common NTDs, but no increase in ODA for NTDs between 2008 and 2012. The allocation of ODA still does not reflect the respective importance of these diseases.
more
Background: A recent report by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) highlights that mental health receives little attention despite being a major cause of disease burden. This paper extends previous assessments of development assistance for mental health (DAMH) in two significant w...ays; first by contrasting DAMH against that for other disease categories, and second by benchmarking allocated development assistance against the core disease burden metric (disability-adjusted life year) as estimated by the Global Burden of Disease Studies. Methods: In order to track DAH, IHME collates information from audited financial records, project level data, and budget information from the primary global health channels. The diverse set of data were standardised and put into a single inflation adjusted currency (2015 US dollars) and each dollar disbursed was assigned up to one health focus areas from 1990 through 2015. We tied these health financing estimates to disease burden estimates (DALYs) produced by the Global Burden of Disease 2015 Study to calculated a standardised measure across health focus areas—development assistance for health (in US Dollars) per DALY.
more
The International Conference on Population and Development in 1994 set targets for donor funding to support family planning programmes, and recent initiatives such as FP2020 have renewed focus on the need for adequate funding to rights-based family planning. Disbursements supporting family planning ...disaggregated by donor, recipient country and year are not available for recent years. We estimate international donor funding for family planning in 2003–13, the period covering the introduction of reproductive health targets to the Millennium Development Goals and up to the beginning of FP2020, and compare funding to unmet need for family planning in recipient countries. We used the dataset of donor disbursements to support reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health developed by the Countdown to 2015 based on the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development Creditor Reporting System.
more
Background:Neonatal mortality accounts for 43% of global under-five deaths and is decreasing more slowly than maternal or child mortality. Donor funding has increased for maternal, newborn, and child health (MNCH), but no analysis to date has disaggregated aid for newborns. We evaluated if and how a...id flows for newborn care can be tracked, examined changes in the last decade, and considered methodological implications for tracking funding for specific population groups or diseases. MethodsandFindings:We critically reviewed and categorised previous analyses of aid to specific populations, diseases, or types of activities. We then developed and refined key terms related to newborn survival in seven languages and searched titles and descriptions of donor disbursement records in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Creditor Reporting System database, 2002–2010. We compared results with the Countdown to 2015 database of aid for MNCH (2003–2008) and the search strategy used by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. Prior to 2005, key terms related to newborns were rare in disbursement records but their frequency increased markedly thereafter. Only two mentions were found of ‘‘stillbirth’’ and only nine references were found to ‘‘fetus’’ in any spelling variant or language
more
Background: The need for sufficient and reliable funding to support health policy and systems research (HPSR) in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) has been widely recognised. Currently, most resources to support such activities come from traditional development assistance for health (DAH) don...ors; however, few studies have examined the levels, trends, sources and national recipients of such support – a gap this research seeks to address. Method: Using OECD’s Creditor Reporting System database, we classified donor funding commitments using a keyword analysis of the project-level descriptions of donor supported projects to estimate total funding available for HPSR-related activities annually from bilateral and multilateral donors, as well as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, to LMICs over the period 2000–2014.
more
Prior research has considered donor funding for developing world health by recipient and donor country but not by disease. Examining funding by disease is critical since diseases may be in competition with one another for priority and donors may be making allocation decisions in ways that do not cor...respond to developing world need. In this study I calculate donor funding for 20 historically high-burden communicable diseases for the years 1996 to 2003 and examine factors that may explain variance in priority levels among diseases. I consider funding for developing world health from 42 major donors, classifying grants according to the communicable disease targeted. Data show that funding does not correspond closely with burden. Acute respiratory infections comprise more than a quarter of the burden among these diseases but receive less than 3% of direct aid. Malaria also stands out as a high-burden neglected disease.
more
Small drinking-water supplies commonly experience operational, managerial, technical and resourcing challenges that impact their ability to deliver safe and reliable services. The needs and opportunities associated with these supplies therefore warrant explicit consideration in policies and regulati...ons.
These Guidelines, specifically tailored to small water supplies, build on over 60 years of guidance by the World Health Organization (WHO) on drinking-water quality and safety. They focus on establishing drinking-water quality regulations and standards that are health based and context appropriate; on proactively managing risks through water safety planning and sanitary inspections; and on carrying out independent surveillance. The guidance is intended primarily for decision-makers at national and subnational levels with responsibility for developing regulatory frameworks and support programmes related to these activities. Other stakeholders involved in water service provision will also benefit from the guidance in this document.
Designed to be practical and accessible, these Guidelines offer clear guidance that is rooted in the principle of progressive improvement. State-of-the-art recommendations and implementation guidance are provided, drawn from a comprehensive evidence review and established good practices. Additionally, case examples are provided from countries and areas around the world to demonstrate how the guidance in this publication has been implemented in practice in a wide variety of contexts.
Together with WHO’s 2024 Sanitary inspection packages – a supporting tool for the Guidelines for drinking-water quality: small water supplies, these Guidelines update and supersede WHO’s 1997 Guidelines for drinking-water quality. Volume 3: surveillance and control of community supplies. Key changes to this updated publication include a greater focus on preventive risk management and a broader range of small water supplies covered, including those managed by households, communities and professional entities.
more
Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are of increasing concern for society and national governments, as well as globally due to their high mortality rate. The main risk factors of NCDs can be classified into the categories of self-management, genetic factors, environmental factors, factors of medical co...nditions, and socio-demographic factors.
more
A collection of 8 infographics on Household Air Pollution.