With a special focus on strategic purchasing and contracting of services from nongovernmental providers, this title reviews ways to make public spending on health care more efficient and equitable in developing countries. It is recommended that: 1) experiments and pilot projects for improving...

This volume grows out of an initiative in the World Bank on resource allocation and purchasing ('RAP'), which started in 2000, and continues to publish articles and books related to strategic purchasing. The initiative emerged from such questions in developing economies as: why do individuals...

Publicly funded and provided health care systems are typically characterized by services that are free of charge, or have nominal user fees collected. This is certainly the case for a number of Former Soviet Union countries - even now - as they struggle to modernize and diversify their health...

The East Asia and Pacific region is characterized by wide variations in sources of healthcarefinancing, pooling of funds, purchasing of care services, and the extent to which thesepolicy instruments and programs provide social protection. Existing healthcare financingsystems in the region are...

As countries in Asia converge on the goal of universal health coverage (UHC), some common challenges are emerging. One is how to ensure coverage of the informal sector so as to make UHC truly universal; a second is how to design a benefit package that is responsive and appropriate to current...

What do consumers pay for pharmaceuticals in a transition economy, and who is hit hardest? Kazakhstan is in the midst of emerging from a Soviet Uniond state to a market economy. It has seen a significant dip in GDP and available revenues for health as a result. New sources of revenues, such as...

The march to Universal Health Coverage (UHC) in China is unparalleled. Since the establishment of the State Council Medical Reform team in 2006,4 the basic objective of China's health reforms has been to provide the whole nation with basic medical and health care, while ensuring equal access to,...