Beyond the terrible toll in human lives and suffering, the Ebola epidemic currently afflicting West Africa is already having a measurable economic impact in terms of forgone output; higher fiscal deficits; rising prices; lower real household incomes and greater poverty. These economic impacts...

While on-track for child health and maternal health MDGs, Lao PDR continues to have some of the worst maternal and child health (MCH) outcomes, both globally and in the East Asia and Pacific (EAP) region. Under-five and infant mortality rates are high relative to GDP per capita, and utilization...

Lao PDR has made notable progress in improving maternal health, with materanal mortality decreasing from 1,600 per 100,000 births in 1990 to 220 in 2013.1 However, in order for further gains to be realized, at least two barriers need to be addressed - the low utilization of maternal health (MH)...

This policy note provides an overview of government health financing in the Lao People's Democratic Republic (PDR), with an added focus on health center financing. The note summarizes overall trends in health outcomes and government health financing over 2000-2014 and analyzes trends in planned...

Thailand has succeeded in expanding coverage of publicly-funded and publicly-managed health insurance schemes, following the introduction of universal health coverage policy in 2001. While Thailand's achievement of universal health coverage (UC) is well noted, recent researches and studies have...

This report presents an assessment of school health policies and institutions that affect young children in Uganda. The analysis is based on a World Bank tool developed as part of the systems approach for better education results (SABER) initiative that aims to systematically assess education...

Afghanistan has made strong gains in health outcomes, health service coverage andhealth systems performance since 2003, with a particular impact on women and children's health. All told, Afghanistan has made notable progress towards achieving the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) targets for...

While Ukraine has spent a significant amount of resources on health, its health outcomes fare poorly when compared with other European countries. For example, average life expectancy at birth in Ukraine has improved from the lowest, 66.8 years in 1995 to 71.4 years in 2016, but is still nine...

This paper is part of additional efforts supported by the World Bank Global Tobacco Control Program to inform the Government of Vietnam on options for tobacco taxation by providing estimates of the impact of cigarette price increase across five income groups for the period 2020-2022 under two...

Disasters and emergencies often have disproportionate impacts on a country's health system and the overall health of women, men, girls, and boys. The interruptions of routine public health programs, such as vaccination campaigns, are common in the wake of a disaster, setting back gains to...