Health Systems

For decades, primary health care in China has been practically forgotten. Most people in China today seek care directly at hospitals rather than local village clinics. With hospitals overwhelmed by patients for even minor conditions, doctors provide low quality care. But a new Health Economics&...

A recent paper by researchers in India shows that average Bangladeshi children are taller than their counterparts from West Bengal, when wealth is controlled for. 

Successful investments in global health—or “best buys”— can be defined in many ways: a cost-effective commodity or technology, a well-trained health workforce, an evidence-informed policy, etc. We recently hosted an event in partnership with PSI, PATH, Devex, and Me...

A recent article shows that removing fees for health care in rural Ghana has no impact on health.  These results are strikingly similar to another recent study that found expanding the US Medicaid insurance program in Oregon also had no impact on physical health (my colleague Victoria...

The Innovation Center at the United States Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services, created under the umbrella of the Affordable Care Act, represents a new and encouraging approach to address this problem, an approach that we think has important lessons for global health.

This week the World Health Organization held a major international meeting on universal health coverage (UHC), with Director General Margaret Chan reaffirming her regard for universal coverage “as the single most powerful concept that public health has to offer.” While the term “universal” signals t...