Recommended Readings, June 20, 2009

categories: Global Health Links, Global Health News

Published June 20, 2009 @ 08:52AM PT

Some great evaluations have come out in the past few days, taking on some of the sacred cows of global health.

We saw a new evaluation of the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria. Impressively, it was commissioned by the global fund itself. The evaluation is not kind; the Center for Global Development Blog has an excellent summary of the report. One thing that comes up in the evaluation is the failure of the Country Coordinating Mechanism to oversee implementation of grants. Based on my own experience with the CCM, that's dead on. You can't expect what is basically a group of disparate volunteers to add unpaid oversight of complex grants to their workload.

Next, the Lancet published a major story on health resource flows. It looked at who funds global health and what that funding supports. The article takes a new approach to estimating global health aid, looking at disbursements rather than commitments, and also at aid from US based NGOs. The Center for Global Development, however, has noticed some weaknesses in the methodology. (Yes, that is two CGD links in two paragraphs. That's because their global health policy blog is amazing. They are especially good on things like this - summarizing and analyzing new reports on global health.) Myself, I wonder if the report doesn't double count some aid. If USAID gives money to World Vision for a health program, does that funding get counted as USAID funding and World Vision funding?

The Lancet is clearly on a roll; they also have a fascinating article on who influences global health. Conclusion: the UN's influence is shrinking and that's not a good thing.

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Author

Alanna Shaikh has spent the last ten years immersed in global health; she has worked for NGOs, companies, universities, and the US government on projects that ranged from preventing antibacterial resistance to improving maternal and child health.