A cautious approach to privatization in Papua New Guinea
THOMASON, JANE; Health Specialist, Asian Development Bank, Manila, Philippines
Журнал:
Health Policy and Planning
Дата:
1994
Аннотация:
Health services in Papua New Guinea have historically been provided predominantly by the public sector, in close partnership with the churches, which are largely subsidized by government and consequently tend to be considered as part of the public health sector. There is a small, but growing private health sector about which little is known and which until recently had developed without involvement by the government. Indeed, little interest was shown by health officials, apart from the occasional animosity of hospital staff to in-patients of private doctors, until the late 1980s when attention was brought to the high levels of attrition of doctors from the public to the private sector. Budgetary constraints felt by the health sector in 1986, as a result of a change in governmental policy, emphasized the need to improve the financial information available to enable policy makers to optimize the use of the limited resources and seek alternative financing sources. One alternative, which has since been the suject of greater interest, has been the potential for sharing the responsibility for health care provision with the private sector. This paper draws together what is known about the private health care sector in Papua New Guinea and discusses the implications of private sector growth for further health planning and policy formulation.
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