Financing of health services

Abstract

The study of sources of finance for health services has always been an important component of the work undertaken by HEFP. Over the period HEFP has been operating, there has been considerable growth in understanding of the conditions in which different financing options available to poor countries tend to prosper or not. We have been concerned to contribute to conceptual understanding of the field as well as to the empirical evidence.

Nursing shortages in the United Kingdom and elsewhere have been a repetitive phenomenon, usually due to an increasing demand for nurses outstripping static or a more slowly growing supply. Demand continues to grow, while projections for supply point to actual reductions in the availability of nurses in some developed and developing countries.