Addis Ababa, Oct. 18 2018: Ethiopia launches the 7th round National Health Account (NHA). . A health account (HA) aims to generate up-to-date empirical evidence on spending in health care in order to inform health policy formulation and development. The Ethiopian government is committed to track spending on health regularly every two or three years and six rounds of health accounts were conducted since the HA introduced in to the country in 2000.
 
His Excellency Dr Kebede Worku, State Minister of Health, who officially opened the launching of the 7th NHA in his remark said that “An understanding of the magnitude and flow of resources in the sector has been very critical for management and policy making in the sector.” H.E. also added that the evidences and facts tracked through the previous 6 rounds of health accounts have been informative and instrumental for the dialogues and joint planning with development partners, to convince legislators in the policy decisions, and to pass the necessary health care financing reforms.  

Dr Paul Mainuka, WHO Representative a.i. in his key note address revealed that WHO has started to provide financial support for the training of the current NHA including this launching event and will continue to provide technical and financial support. Dr Paul also congratulated the ministry of health for institutionalizing the NHA in the Health Economics and financing analysis case team.

The Partnership and Cooperation Directorate made the three presentations on Ethiopian Health Sector Priorities and Importance of National Health Account (NHA), introduction to Health care financing and on Introduction and conceptual overview of System of Health Account (SHA) 2011 which is a globally recognized framework used to track health funds from their sources to their end uses and then followed by a discussion and way forwards.                                                            

The Federal Ministry of Health is currently in the process of institutionalizing the health accounts methodology in Ethiopia and thus the Health Economics and Financing Analysis Case Team have been established, which is responsible for conducting health accounts on regular basis, including the current round. Key technical people have already been selected and trained from the Ministry staff and they are coordinating and leading the NHA undertakings.  The ministry of health is also working on mechanisms to build up its human resource capacity and also identifying avenues for the data requirements to be routinely collected as part of the overall monitoring of the health sector’s performance.

The NHA launching was attended by representatives of the Federal Ministry of Finance and Economic Cooperation, members of the Health Care Financing Technical Working Group (TWG) members including Fenot / Harvard School of Public Health, USAID, Abt Associates UNICEF and other members of the TWGs, representatives of the Regional Health Bureaus (RHBs), development partners in health, the private sector and Non-Governmental Organizations.

For further information contact:
Ermias Dessie, Health Economics and Financing Analysis Case Team, Technical Advisors, WHO
Dr Sofonias Getachew, NPO HSS, WHO
Selamawit Yilma, Communications Officer, WHO