Search

Background: Health policy interventions were expected to improve access to health care delivery, provide financial risk protection, besides reducing inequities that underlie geographic and socio-economic variation in population access to health care. This article examines whether health policy interventions and accelerated health investments in India during 2004–2018 could close the gap in inequity in health care utilization and access to public subsidy by different population groups. Did the poor and socio-economically vulnerable population gain from such government initiatives, compared to the rich and affluent sections of society? And whether the intended objective of improving equity between different regions of the country been achieved during the policy initiatives? This article attempts to assess and provide robust evidence in the Indian context. Methods: Employing Benefit-Incidence Analysis (BIA) framework, this paper advances earlier evidence by highlighting estimates of health care utilization, concentration and government subsidy by broader provider categories (public versus private) and across service levels (outpatient, inpatient, maternal, pre-and post-natal services). We used 2 waves of household surveys conducted by the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) on health and morbidity. The period of analysis was chosen to represent policy interventions spanning 2004 (pre-policy) and 2018 (post-policy era). We present this evidence across three categories of Indian states, namely, high-focus states, high-focus north eastern states and non-focus states. Such categorization facilitates quantification of reform impact of policy level interventions across the three groups. Results: Utilisation of healthcare services, except outpatient care visits, accelerated significantly in 2018 from 2004. The difference in utilisation rates between poor and rich (between poorest 20% and richest 20%) had significantly declined during the same period. As far as concentration of healthcare is concerned, the Concentrate Index (CI) underlying inpatient care in public sector fell from 0.07 in 2004 to 0.05 in 2018, implying less pro-rich distribution. The CI in relation to pre-natal, institutional delivery and postnatal services in government facilities were pro-poor both in 2004 and 2018 in all 3 groups of states. The distribution of public subsidy underscoring curative services (inpatient and outpatient) remained pro-rich in 2004 but turned less pro-rich in 2018, measured by CIs which declined sharply across all groups of states for both outpatient (from 0.21 in 2004 to 0.16 in 2018) and inpatient (from 0.24 in 2004 to 0.14 in 2018) respectively. The CI for subsidy on prenatal services declined from approximately 0.01 in 2004 to 0.12 in 2018. In respect to post-natal care, similar results were observed, implying the subsidy on prenatal and post-natal services was overwhelmingly received by poor. The CI underscoring subsidy for institutional delivery although remained positive both in 2018 and 2004, but slightly increased from 0.17 in 2004 to 0.28 in 2018. Conclusions: Improvement in infrastructure and service provisioning through NHM route in the public facilities appears to have relatively benefited the poor. Yet they received a relatively smaller health subsidy than the rich when utilising inpatient and outpatient health services. Inequality continues to persist across all healthcare services in private health sector. Although the NHM remained committed to broader expansion of health care services, a singular focus on maternal and child health conditions especially in backward regions of the country has yielded desired results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This paper aimed at estimating the resources required to implement a community Score Card by a typical rural district health team in Uganda, as a mechanism for fostering accountability, utilization and quality of maternal and child healthcare service. Methods: This costing analysis was done from the payer's perspective using the ingredients approach over five quarterly rounds of scoring between 2017 and 2018. Expenditure data was obtained from project records, entered and analyzed in Microsoft excel. Two scale-up scenarios, scenario one (considered cost inputs by the MakSPH research teams) and scenario two (considering cost inputs based on contextual knowledge from district implementing teams), were simulated to better understand the cost implications of integrating the Community Score Card (CSC) into a district health system. Results: The total and average cost of implementing CSC for five quarterly rounds over a period of 18 months were USD 59,962 and USD 11,992 per round of scoring, respectively. Considering the six sub-counties (including one Town Council) in Kibuku district that were included in this analysis, the average cost of implementating the CSC in each sub-county was USD 1998 per scoring round. Scaling-up of the intervention across the entire district (included 22 sub-counties) under the first scenario would cost a total of USD 19,003 per scoring round. Under the second scaleup scenario, the cost would be lower at USD 7116. The total annual cost of scaling CSC in the entire district would be USD 76,012 under scenario one compared to USD 28,465 under scenario two. The main cost drivers identified were transportation costs, coordination and supervision costs, and technical support to supplement local implementers. Conclusion: Our analysis suggests that it is financially feasible to implement and scale-up the CSC initiative, as an accountability tool for enhancing service delivery. However, the CSC design and approach needs to be embedded within local systems and implemented in collaboration with existing stakeholders so as to optimise costs. A comprehensive economic analysis of the costs associated with transportation, involvement of the district teams in coordination, supervision as well as provision of technical support is necessary to determine the cost-effectiveness of the CSC approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Maternity leave policies are designed to protect gender equality and the health of mothers in the workforce and their children. However, maternity leave schemes are often linked to jobs in the formal sector economy. In low- and middle-income countries a large share of women work in the informal sector, and are not eligible to such benefit. This is worrisome from a social justice and a policy perspective and suggests the need for intervening. Costing the implementation of potential interventions is needed for facilitating informed decisions by policy makers. Methods: We developed and applied a costing methodology to assess the cost of a maternity leave cash transfer to be operated in the informal sector of the economy in Brazil and Ghana, two countries with very different employment structures and socioeconomic contexts. We conducted sensitivity analysis by modeling different numbers of weeks covered. Results: In Brazil, the cost of the maternity cash transfer would be between 0.004% and 0.02% of the GDP, while in Ghana it would range between 0.076% and 0.28% of the GDP. The relative cost of rolling out a maternity intervention in Brazil is between 2.2 to 3.2 times the cost in Ghana depending on the benchmark used to assess the welfare measure. The differences in costs between countries was related to differences in labor market structure as well as demographic characteristics. Conclusions: Findings show how a standard methodology that relies on routinely available information is feasible and could assist policymakers in estimating the costs of supporting a maternity cash transfer for women employed in the informal sector, such intervention is expected to contribute to social justice, gender equity, and health trajectories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of International Journal for Equity in Health is the property of BioMed Central and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)