An Essential Health Benefit (EHB) is a policy intervention designed to direct resources to priority areas of health service delivery to reduce disease burdens and ensure equity in health. Many east and southern Africa (ESA) countries have introduced or updated EHB in the 2000s. Recognising this, the Regional Network for Equity in Health in East and Southern Africa (EQUINET), through Ifakara Health Institute (IHI) and Training and Research Support Centre (TARSC), with country partners from Ministries of Health (MoH) in Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia, implemented research to understand the facilitators and the barriers in nationwide application of the EHB in resourcing, organising and in accountability on integrated, equitable universal health services. A regional review of literature on EHBs in the four country case study reports from the research programme are available on the EQUINET website. This report presents the proceedings of a regional consultative meeting convened on November 27-28, 2017 to present and discuss evidence from the research programme. The regional document review covering 16 east and southern African (ESA) countries, the findings from the country case studies in Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia, experiences from South Africa and Zanzibar and a regional synthesis of the evidence from across the programme were presented at the meeting, and background documents made available. The meeting aimed to: a. Identify issues arising in the motivations for developing the EHB; the methods used to develop, define and cost them; their dissemination, communication and use within countries, including in budgeting, resourcing and purchasing health services; and, in monitoring health system performance for accountability; b. Identify policy-relevant and operational national and regional level recommendations on the role, design and use of EHB; and c. Propose areas for follow up policy, action and research.
Latest Equinet Updates
Three years have passed since the World Health Organisation (WHO) Commission on the Social Determinants of Health (CSDH) report was launched and adopted by the World Health Assembly. Progress since 2008 at the international level has been built on the experience and initiative of different countries. For example in Africa in April 2008, work on social determinants of health (SDH) was located in the context of commitments to revitalise primary health care. The first global ministerial conference on healthy lifestyles and non-communicable disease (NCD) control in April 2011 and the UN High-level Meeting on NCD Prevention and Control in September 2011 provide important global platforms to address the SDH. Nevertheless there is debate whether adequate attention has been given to SDH in these forums. On 19-21 October 2011, WHO and the Government of Brazil are convening a global conference on the SDH in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The conference will hopefully provide a platform to tackle issues of social justice in development, to address the deficiencies in present economic thinking on and measures in globalisation.
The Third EQUINET Regional Conference on Equity in Health in east and southern Africa will be held at Speke Conference Centre, Munyonyo, Kampala, Uganda September 23-25, 2009. People are welcome from government, non-state organisations, academic and research institutions, civil society, parliaments, regional and international organisations and other institutions promoting and working on equity in health in east and southern Africa! The conference theme is 'Reclaiming the Resources for Health: Building Universal People Centred Health Systems in East and Southern Africa' and it will highlight opportunities for improving health equity in east and southern Africa.
A reminder to all who have registered that the third EQUINET Regional Conference on Equity in Health in East and Southern Africa is coming up next month! It provides a unique opportunity to hear original work and debate on the determinants of, challenges to and opportunities for equity in health in this region. The programme is broad and covers a range of topics including claiming rights to health, equitable health services, women’s health and social empowerment in health systems. Other main topics include retaining health workers, primary health care, developing and using participatory approaches, resourcing health systems fairly, building parliamentary alliances and people's power in health, policy engagement for health equity, trade and health, access to health care and monitoring equity. We will also show how to build country alliances and conduct regional networking. A post-conference workshop will be held on BANG (bits, atoms, neurons and genes), billed the Next Technological Challenge to Africa’s Health and Well-being. Further activities associated with the conference include photographic displays and skills meetings. Registration has closed, but the abstract book for the conference will be posted to the EQUINET website after the conference and a report will be produced from the conference that will also be on the site. Registered conference delegates should have received information on their delegate status, an information sheet on the conference arrangements and delegates sponsored for travel should have received their e tickets. Letters have been sent to those who need visas. For any queries around visa's or local arrangements please contact gloevents@infocom.co.ug. Speakers have been briefed by their session convenors. If you have not received relevant information above please contact admin@equinetafrica.org. To see the conference programme visit www.equinetafrica.org/conference2009/programme.php.
EQUINET, PHM, CWGH, TAC, SATUCC, Southern African Social Forum, SEATINI, PATAM and HAI convened a regional meeting of health civil society on February 17-19 2005 in Zambia, with local hosts CHESSORE.
The meeting resolved to build a united health civil society campaign for a national peoples health system. The meeting identified that to build this the region needs to address pressing issues of:
- investing in adequate, well trained, appropriate, equitably distributed and motivated health workers;
- ensuring sustained increased fair financing of the universal right to health, through rising investment in the public health sector;
- building a critical mass of conscious and organised people, with rights to meaningfully participate in their health systems,
- resisting privatisation and promoting public interests and national authority in trade agreements in the health sector.
The meeting agreed that health civil society is unified by common values and pursuit of the fundamental right to health and to life, of equity and social justice and of people led and people centred health systems.
The Southern and East African Trade information Institute, (SEATINI) and the Centre for Health Policy (CHP) Wits University and Training and Research Support Centre (TARSC) with the Regional network on Equity in Health in southern Africa (EQUINET) will be hosting a technical meeting on promoting health in trade agreements in east and southern Africa on Tuesday 28 to Thursday 30 June 2005 in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
Hon Guracha Galgalo, Chairman of the Parliamentary committee on Health, Housing and Social Services in the Kenya National Assembly was tragically killed in an accident that killed fourteen people after a Kenya Airforce plane crashed into a hill in Marsabit on 10 April 2006. Among those on board the plane were Assistant Ministers Mirugi Kariuki and Titus Nguyoni and MPs Bonaya Godana, Abdi Sasura and Guracha Galgalo. Hon Guracha Galgalo as Chairman of the Parliamentary committee on Health, Housing and Social Services worked with the Nairobi Equity Gauge, GEGA and EQUINET in building parliamenary work to promote equity in health in Kenya and in east and southern Africa. EQUINET has expressed deepest sympathy and heartfelt condolences to Hom Galgalos family, to the members of the Committee and the Kenyan National Assembly as a whole.
In 2007 EQUINET with Centre for Health Policy University of the Witwatersrand is implementing a programme that aims to build capacity in health policy analysis in east and southern Africa. The participants will meet for the first time in February 2007 in Johannesburg to attend a policy analysis course, after which they will spend a further week developing their study protocols. The research will be conducted between March and September 2007, with all the participants meeting again in October 2007 for a workshop that will support data analysis and report writing.
Health Centre Committees are potentially critical vehicles for community voice in health systems. They play not only a service and mobilisation role, but can be effective tools to improve the responsiveness and accountability of services – and thus have an important governance role to play. UCT’s Health and Human Rights programme in the School of Public Health and Family Medicine has been working with Zimbabwean and Zambian partners in EQUINET, on a project under the leadership of the Community Working Group on Health (CWGH) to strengthen Health Centre Committees (HCC’s) as vehicles for social participation in health systems in East and Southern Africa (ESA). UCT has led work to review and assemble capacity building materials for Health Committee training. . They found HCC training materials and processes in a number of countries, including Ethiopia, Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Zimbabwe and Zambia. The training commonly covered introductions to the health system, its governance, planning and budget processes and HCC roles. It included information on HCCs functions such as problem solving, monitoring and accountability and social mobilization. There were gaps in some areas, such as on conflict management, fundraising, inter-sectoral work and deeper analysis of the causes of social inequalities in ill health and how to address them.
Training and Research Support Centre (TARSC), the Ifakara Health Research and Development Centre (IHRDC) with The Southern African Regional Network on Equity in Health (EQUINET) and CHESSORE Zambia invites applicants to participate and share experiences in a Workshop on Participatory Methods for research and training for a people centred health system being held in Bagamoyo, Tanzania, March 1-4, 2006.