Strengthening health systems
Strengthening health systems thereby makes it possible to offer comprehensive health provision, with all its components structured and user-oriented. This is a holistic approach and requires taking simultaneous action on the 6 building blocks of health systems defined by WHO: health service delivery; health workforce; health information systems; access to essential medicines; health systems financing; leadership and governance.
Today, the health systems of Expertise France’s partner countries remain fragile in many respects. Their weak performance constrains their capacity to react in the event of health crises such as Ebola, or guarantee equitable and high-quality healthcare provision for all. Strengthening health systems also requires public policies which include all populations and comprise a comprehensive social-health agenda.
Expertise France takes action to strengthen health systems, working closely with partner countries in order to assist them in the implementation of the priorities set out in their national health plans. In this context, the agency mobilises expertise in several essential areas. They include management and supply systems for drugs and health products, health human resources, information systems and e-health, and institutional and hospital governance.
Two projects illustrate the agency’s action to strengthen health systems.
The first concerns institutional capacity building for the Ministry of Health and Public Hygiene in Côte d’Ivoire, which provides support for the definition of the public health code, the implementation of the hospital reform, the development and capacity building of the Inspectorate General of Health, and the establishment of a supervisory and regulatory system for health facilities and professions in the private sector.
The second concerns capacity building for hospital management in the Republic of Congo.
