I joined about 800 health care professionals, from scientists to policy-makers, at the 13th Annual Scientific Conference (ASCON XIII) of the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (ICDDR,B) that took place March 14 to March 17 to discuss “Science to accelerate universal health coverage.”
The 2010 World Health Report on Health systems financing: the path to universal coverage indicates an emerging global focus in coverage and national financing mechanisms for health. One of the authors of the report, Dr. David Evans, Director of Health Systems Financing at the World Health Organization, shared that over one billion people worldwide cannot access the services that they need, often because of prohibitive cost. An additional 150 million access services but at the cost of financial catastrophe. Bangladesh, like many other low-income countries, lacks a national health insurance program, and although increasing resources are allocated to health programs which indicates emerging opportunities, substantial questions still remain.
“Tracking progress towards universal health coverage with equity” Panel (from left): Dr. Faruque Ahmed, Director, Health Programme, BRAC, Bangladesh; M.M. Neazuddin, Director General of Family Planning, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of Bangladesh; Dr. Jeannette Vega, Director, Centre for Public Health Policy, Universidad del Desarrollo de Chile, Chile; Tahmina Begum, Consultant, GIZ TC support to HNPSP, Bangladesh; A.K.M. Nazrul Haider, Consultant, Information Technology, ICDDR,B, Bangladesh