Uzair bin Farid

The government aims to ensure thatmore than 60% of Pakistan’s population have access to the Universal Health Coverage (UHC)by the year 2030. According to the data available with WealthPK, the government is obliged to increase the scope of UHC to 80% of the population under its commitments to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations. The government measures the extent of UHC from the baseline year of 2015, when the scope of UHC was 39.7% of the total population. The year for which the latest data is available – 2021 – recorded a UHC index value of 52%, which is a 30.9% increase over the baseline index value of 39.7%. Among the four provinces, the Azad Jammu and Kashmir and the Gilgit-Baltistan regions, the highest increase in the value of UHC index was recorded for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

In 2015, the UHC index value of KP stood at 36.2%, whereas in 2021 the UHC increased to 49.8% of the population. This represented an increase of 37.5% over the baseline index value of 2015 for the province. It was followed by the Gilgit-Baltistan region, which recorded an increase of 35.5% in the six years under consideration. In 2015 it had a baseline UHC index value of 35.8%, which increased to 48.5% in the year 2021. The least change was observed for the Sindh province, which recorded an increase of 27.6% from the year 2015 to the year 2021. In 2021, it had a UHC index value of 48% compared to 37.6% in the year 2015.

Source: Planning Commission of Pakistan

The government has made it a priority that the people get ‘equitable access’ to affordable and quality health without facing any financial hardships. These aims are recognised as a ‘top priority’ in Pakistan’s National Health Vision 2016-2025, the National Action Plan 2019-23 and the respective provincial health strategies. To that end, the government has already developed a reasonably pricedGeneric Essential Package of Health Services(EPHS) based on Disease Control Priorities 3 (DCP-3).The package has been developed by the Ministry of National Health Services in coordination with the provincial health authorities.

The government is also working with international multilateral institutions like the World Bank to procure resources for instituting essential health reforms across the country. They have already agreed on a concept note of ‘National Health Support Programme’, which will amount to $258 million. The disbursement for the NHSP will be done in a phased manner based on the achievements of the federal and provincial authorities to meet the targets set in the national and provincial health policies.

Credit: INP-WealthPk