UHC Forward: Towards Universal Health Coverage

The world’s premier global health journal, The Lancet, released a special collection of papers exploring the social, political, and economic issues around the global movement towards universal health coverage (UHC) – defined by the World Health Organization as everyone in a population having access to appropriate, promotive, preventive, curative, and rehabilitative health care when they need it and at an affordable cost. This series comes at a time when UHC has been at the forefront of the global public health conversation – and is a significant step forward in an effort to achieve a UN resolution on UHC, and embed UHC prominently within the post-Millennium Development Goals framework.

This first of its kind series addresses and expands upon three critical elements in the global movement towards UHC: the effects of universal health coverage on population health; government involvement in universal health coverage, and how low-income and lower middle-income countries in Africa and Asia are progressing towards universal health coverage.

Since the release of the 2010 World Health Report, the global momentum for universal health coverage has continued to grow. At the 2012 World Health Assembly, Margaret Chan announced that UHC “is the single most powerful concept that public health has to offer”. Numerous countries, from Thailand to Mexico to South Africa are experimenting with models for moving toward UHC by utilizing health financing mechanisms to protect against financial risk, increase access to essential health services, and improve health outcomes.

The series features viewpoints from a diverse set of global actors in the public health space, including David Evans & Carissa Etienne of the World Health Organization, Julio Frenk, the former Mexican Minister of Health and current Dean of the Harvard School of Public Health, an introduction from Rockefeller Foundation President Judith Rodin and Results for Development President David de Ferranti, and an analysis from Jeffrey Sachs looking at how poor people in low-income countries can achieve an adequate standard of health care.

You can access all the papers for free on the Lancet website (you will have to create first an account). http://www.thelancet.com/themed-universal-health-coverage