Correspondence to Abdur Razzaque Sarker; [email protected] Bangladesh is among the most densely populated countries in the world and has enjoyed a steady annual economic growth of 5–6% for more than a decade. According to the Bangladesh economic review, the incidence of poverty has declined considerably from 56.7% in 1991–1992 to 24.8% in 2015. The demographic structure of Bangladesh is chan...

The passage of a UN General Assembly resolution on universal health coverage (UHC) in December, 2012, underlines how UHC is becoming a key global health objective. Adopted by consensus, the resolution urged member states to develop health systems that avoid substantial direct payments at the point of delivery and to implement mechanisms for pooling risks to avoid catastrophic health-care spendi...

Introduction Serious efforts are taking place worldwide to attain universal health coverage (UHC). In India, although an unattained goal for long, recent recommendations of the High Level Expert Group (HLEG) instituted by the Planning Commission have brought the UHC agenda to its zenith [1]. However, actualisation of HLEG recommendations requires an in-depth understanding of the structural and ...

Perspectives There is a burgeoning movement towards universal health coverage (UHC) – both at the national and the global political level – that seeks to ensure that all people everywhere receive the health services they need without experiencing financial hardship. The 25 wealthiest nations all have some form of universal coverage, as do several middle-income countries, including Brazil, Mexic...

We outline key conclusions of the World Health Organisation's report 'Making Fair Choices on the Path to Universal Health Coverage (UHC)'. The Report argues that three principles should inform choices on the path to UHC: I. Coverage should be based on need, with extra weight given to the needs of the worse off; II. One aim should be to generate the greatest total improvement in health; III. Con...

Universal health coverage (UHC) is a key policy issue in countries of the World Health Organization (WHO) South-East Asia Region. However, despite projections of significant increases in burden, there is little protection against the financial risks associated with noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), including diabetes. Thailand achieved UHC of all 67 million of the population in 2002, under three...

The focus on public policy and health equity is discussed in reference to the current global health policy discussion on Universal Health Coverage (UHC). This initiative has strong commitment from the leadership of the international organizations involved, but a lack of policy clarity outside of the health financing component may limit the initiative’s impact on health inequity. In order to add...

Global discussions on universal health coverage (UHC) have focussed attention on the need for increased government funding for health care in many low- and middle-income countries. The objective of this paper is to explore potential targets for government spending on health to progress towards UHC. An explicit target for government expenditure on health care relative to gross domestic product (...

Success in the implementation of evidence-based interventions (EBIs) in different settings has had variable success. Implementation research offers the approach needed to understand the variability of health outcomes from implementation strategies in different settings and why interventions were successful in some countries and failed in others. When mastered and embedd...