With increased life expectancy, declining fertility, and sustained economic growth, the disease burden in Bangladesh has shifted from infectious to noncommunicable diseases (NCDs). The policy options and strategic priorities to tackle NCDs are via multisectoral interventions, preventive, and treatment services.
The formation of human capital--the knowledge, skills, and health that people accumulate over their lifetimes--is critical for the six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries. Human capital contributes not only to human development and employment but also to the long-term sustainability of a diversified economic growth model that is knowledge based and private sector driven. This approach is critical, given that income from oil and gas will eventually decline and that the nature of work is evolving in response to rapid technological changes, in turn demanding new skill sets. The GCC governments have demonstrated their strong political will for this shift: four of them are among the first countries to join the World Bank’s Human Capital Project—a global effort to improve investments in people as measured by the Human Capital Index. The GCC countries face four main challenges: • Low levels of basic proficiency among schoolchildren • A mismatch between education and the labor market • A relatively high rate of adult mortality and morbidity • A unique labor market , in which wages in the public sector are more generous than in the private sector and government employment of nationals is virtually guaranteed To address these challenges, this report outlines four strategies in a“whole-of-government†? approach: • Investing in high-quality early childhood development • Preparing healthier, better educated, and skilled youth for the future • Enabling greater adult labor force participation • Creating an enabling environment for human capital formation These strategies are based on best practices in other countries and feature some of the GCC countries’ plans, including their national “Visions,†? to take their economies and societies further into the twenty-first century. With the COVID-19 pandemic, the GCC countries face additional challenges that may worsen some preexisting vulnerabilities and erode human capital. In response, the GCC governments have taken multiple measures to protect their populations’ health and their economies. Any country’s decision to reopen its economy needs to closely consider public health consequences to avoid a resurgence of infections and any further erosion of its human capital. The COVID-19 crisis underscores that the need to accelerate and improve investment in human capital has never been greater. Once the GCC countries return to a “new normal,†? they will be in a position to achieve diversified and sustainable growth by adopting, and then tailoring, the strategies presented in this report.
South Asia Region (SAR) has decreased maternal mortality ratio (MMR) by 65 percent between 1990 and 2013, which was the greatest progress among all world regions. Such achievement implores the question, What made SAR stand out against what is predicted by standard socioeconomic outcomes? Improving Maternal and Reproductive Health in South Asia: Drivers and Enablers identifies the interventions and factors that contributed to reducing MMR and improving maternal and reproductive health (MRH) outcomes in SAR. In this study, the analytical framework assumes that improving MRH outcomes is influenced by a multitude of forces from within and outside the health system and considers factors at the household and community levels, as well as interventions in other sectors and factors in the enabling environment. The analysis is based on a structured literature review of the interventions in SAR countries, relevant international experience, and review of the best available evidence from systematic reviews. The focus of the analysis is mainly on assessing the effectiveness of interventions. The findings from this study indicate that the most effective interventions that prevent maternal mortality are those that address the intra-partum stage - the point where most maternal deaths occur - and include improving skilled birth attendance coverage, increasing institutional delivery rates, and scaling up access to emergency obstetric care. There is also adequate evidence that investing in family planning to increase contraceptive use also played a key role during the inter-partum phase by preventing unwanted pregnancies and thus averting the risk of maternal mortality in SAR countries. Outside the programmatic interventions, the levels of household income, women’s education, and completion of secondary education of girls were also strongly correlated with improved MRH outcomes. Also, there is strong evidence that health financing schemes - both demand and supply side - and conditional cash transfer programs were effective in increasing the uptake of MRH services. The study points out to many other interventions with different degrees of effectiveness. The study also identified four major reasons for why SAR achieved this progress in MMR reduction. The best practices and evidence of what works synthesized in this study provide an important way forward for low- and middle-income countries toward achieving the health-related Sustainable Development Goals.
Bangladesh is committed to achieving universal health coverage (UHC) by 2032; to this end, the government of Bangladesh is exploring policy options to increase fiscal space for health and expand coverage while improving service quality and availability. Despite Bangladesh’s impressive strides in improving its economic and social development outcomes, the government still confronts health financing and service delivery challenges. In its review of the health system, this study highlights the limited fiscal space for implementing UHC in Bangladesh, particularly given low public spending for health and high out-of-pocket expenditure. The crisis in the country’s human resources for health (HRH) compounds public health service delivery inefficiencies. As the government explores options to finance its UHC plan, it must recognize that reform of its service delivery system with particular focus on HRH has to be the centerpiece of any policy initiative.
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