​​​For countries wanting to strengthen health budget execution, learning about promising approaches used by others is one thing but putting them into practice is another. This blog reveals how two countries, Lao PDR and Peru, adapted promising practices and began to implement them.

Ministries of health know that priority setting is important, but explicit priority-setting processes — processes that are inclusive, transparent, and informed by evidence — often are not institutionalized. This blog shares the promising practices being used in several countries.

Timor-Leste is laser focused on recruiting, deploying, and retaining highly qualified health workers to rebuild the country’s health system workforce. 

With a grant from LHSS, the Jamaican health care firm Online Medics is supporting the government’s COVID-19 vaccination effort while gaining valuable new business capacities. “LHSS allowed me to think in the long term – where I wanted my company to go and what I need to do to get it there,” says owner Alex Tracey.

Ukraine prioritizes telemedicine as part of its comprehensive health reform to increase transparency of health service provision, expand access to quality health services, and enhance efficiency in the health sector.

Excerpts from an interview with Mr. Marcelo Amaral, Director General of Corporate Service at the Ministry of Health in Timor-Leste.

The Vietnam government transitions funding of TB treatment to the SHI fund with support from LHSS. This transition marks a critical milestone, ensuring uninterrupted access to life-saving treatment.

When the next emergency hits, health authorities will have a plan ready to activate. 

How can countries make progress towards good health budget execution? In this latest blog in our budget execution series, ministry of health practitioners from eight countries offer lessons based on their own experiences and shared learning. 

Since vaccines became available in 2021, only 26 percent of Jamaicans have been vaccinated – a far cry from the country’s goal of 65 percent by March 2022. Religious communities were among the victims of the misinformation causing vaccine hesitancy, with many of the country’s Christians believing the vaccines represented “the mark of the beast.” In response, the government called on church leaders to play a more prominent role in the country’s vaccination effort.

Through an LHSS-Joint Learning Network learning exchange, health practitioners from seven countries are sharing successful experiences and promising practices to institutionalize explicit national priority-setting processes for health. The goal? To help countries set equitable national health priorities and ensure that these priorities are reflected in national health plans and budgets.

Both Ghana and Bangladesh have implemented health budget accountability mechanisms. Their experiences offer practical lessons that other countries can adapt to their own budget execution needs. 

Colombia has emerged as a leader in creating policies to integrate migrants into the economy and society, guaranteeing their right to health and mobilizing domestic resources to meet the increased demand for health services.

Health workers play a central role not only in providing continued care for COVID-19 patients, but also in promoting vaccination and combating misinformation, with evidence-based health education. 

What do Lao PDR, Malaysia, and Kenya have in common? All three countries have strengthened their budget structures and processes to enable good health budget execution. Their experiences hold valuable lessons for others striving to increase budget execution and unlock significant resources for health.