Two decades of Tanzanian health policy: Examining policy developments and opportunities through a gender lens

Arbeitspapier

Tanzania has undertaken important health sector reforms in the new millennium, and the most recent Health Sector Strategic Plan (2021-26) lays out ambitious targets to achieve universal health coverage. Yet, women in Tanzania continue to face significant barriers in accessing healthcare and the country is grappling with important gender-biased health challenges disadvantaging women. The aims of this paper are two-fold. First, we examine the evolution of Tanzania's health policy over the past two decades (2000-21) from the perspective of enhancing financial protection for working-age women. Second, we explore policy options for genderresponsive health insurance expansion in the context of Tanzania. Methodologically, the paper draws on a scoping study of diverse literature and data and a review of evidence from other contexts with public health insurance schemes. We find that Tanzania has a fragmented health system that relies on several independent schemes introduced throughout the years, characterized by insufficient risk-pooling. Such a system provides insufficient financial protection for workingage women and female-headed households, which are financially less secure than dual-earner households. Although expanding health insurance coverage represents a viable corrective measure, future reforms must account for women's lower financial contribution capacity to enable equitable access. Additionally, the policy design requires gender-mainstreamed investments in awarenessraising, service quality, and benefit packages.

Angaben zum Objekt

• ISBN: 978-92-9267-161-7
• Sprache: Englisch

Verweise und Beziehungen

• Erschienen in: Series: WIDER Working Paper ; No. 2022/30

Klassifikation und Themen

• Klassifikation: Wirtschaft ; Health Insurance, Public and Private ; Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
• Thema: Tanzania ; women ; health policy ; financial protection ; health insurance

Beteiligte, Orts- und Zeitangaben

• Ereignis: Geistige Schöpfung
• (wer): Lambin, Roosa ; Nyyssölä, Milla
• Ereignis: Veröffentlichung
• (wer): The United Nations University World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER)
• (wo): Helsinki
• (wann): 2022

Weitere Informationen

• DOI: doi:10.35188/UNU-WIDER/2022/161-7
• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/259386
• Letzte Aktualisierung: 10.03.2025, 11:42 MEZ